


Koru (spiral into you)

by Janice_Lester



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Rape Roleplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-11
Updated: 2011-03-11
Packaged: 2017-11-27 06:30:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/658942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Janice_Lester/pseuds/Janice_Lester
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bones has issues.  Jim has a plan he might not be able to stick to.  Also, there is travel, there is bourbon, and there is a lot of hanging out at Bones's on-campus apartment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Koru (spiral into you)

**Author's Note:**

> This story contains a noncon roleplay scene. It's consensual and played with safe-words, but if it sounds like an issue for you please feel free to skip this fic (or to PM me with further questions if that helps). It includes physical restraint (character held down), and there is a brief moment where the topic of breathplay is referenced. Slight AU. Awesome alpha: [](http://ellethill.livejournal.com/profile)[**ellethill**](http://ellethill.livejournal.com/). Awesome beta: [](http://nix-this.livejournal.com/profile)[**nix_this**](http://nix-this.livejournal.com/). The banner is by the charming [](http://anoncomment7.livejournal.com/profile)[**anoncomment7**](http://anoncomment7.livejournal.com/). The art at the end is by [](http://nix-this.livejournal.com/profile)[nix_this](http://nix-this.livejournal.com/).

The first time Jim tries, and fails, to get his new best buddy into bed, he’s not exactly on his A-game. It’s understandable. He’s just got out of a practical hand-to-hand combat class where he wasn’t picked last, he was actually picked first.

By Cupcake.

Pretty it was not.

So there Jim is, perched gingerly on the edge of a bio-bed in the campus clinic, waiting to hear what kinds of drugs they want to give him and whether the doctor on duty has bothered to check his medical file to find out whether he’s had adverse reactions to them in the past. It’s a pain in the ass having to intercept docs before they can jab you with hypos (which is also a pain in the neck), and then trying tactfully to ask whether they’ve done their fucking jobs, but you get uncomfortably used to it after enough bad reactions to things.

The doc who comes in is crazy-divorced-good-bourbon-guy from the shuttle. He’s shaved. And cut his hair. And is wearing a blue medical coat over jeans and a t-shirt, as if he’s been called in unexpectedly to work today and hasn’t had a chance to change.

“Kirk, James T.,” the crazy doctor guy reads off his padd without looking up. “Dislocated shoulder, which you fixed yourself, and other injuries received in—” He looks up.

Jim smiles a bit awkwardly and waves at him. “Hello. Doctor McCoy, wasn’t it?”

McCoy frowns a minute. “Jim. The kid from—” He raises an eyebrow, apparently recalling. “You got a knack for getting beat up or something?”

“I just have a pretty face. Most folks either want to kiss it or break it.”

McCoy winces.

“Sometimes both,” Jim adds, on reflection.

After that, it’s all medical tricorders and muttering for a while. Apparently he did just fine getting his shoulder back in its socket with that awesome Chinese cadet’s help. But he’s broken a couple small bones in his hand—no doubt on Cupcake’s thick skull—and they’ll have to spend ten minutes under the osteo-regenerator.

“All right,” says the doc, loading his hypospray. “Now, I’m just gonna give you something for the pain, and then another shot to help your body heal the—”

Jim sighs. It’s kinda pleasant, meeting a medical professional he doesn't want to strangle, and this might fuck that up completely, but he still has to do it. “Have you, er, checked my allergy list and shit? It’s such a drag for all concerned when a doc doesn’t. And, don’t get me wrong, I’m all for extreme sports and other stupid stunts, but respiratory distress isn’t exactly fun.”

McCoy peers at him for a long moment. Then he grabs for the padd, hands it straight to Jim. “I did indeed check your allergy list. But how’s about you have a glance at it, make sure nothing’s been left off? Anytime folks move about, things tend to get messed up in their medical files.”

So Jim checks, but apart from the fact they have his date of birth wrong in one section—his fucking _date of birth_ —it all looks right. He nods and gives the padd back. McCoy sets it back down at the foot of the bio-bed without another glance. Then he raises his hypospray to Jim’s neck, holds it there.

“You realise, of course, that even if you’ve had this before with no adverse reaction, things might’ve changed? That’s why we keep you here for half an hour or so afterwards. You give a holler if something don’t feel right, you hear?”

Jim nods obediently, and gets a sharp jab in the neck for his troubles. But it’s good stuff, and he’s soon smiling easily again.

“Thanks, doc.” He sways happily in place until another hiss and pinch on the neck distracts him from his high. By the time he blinks the little cubicle back into focus, the doc has almost finished sliding a weird black lumpy thing over his injured hand.

“This may hurt a little,” he says, and then squeezes Jim’s hand, hard, through the black thing.

“ _Fuck!_ ”

The doc ignores him, firing up his tricorder again to scan the hand which is now held painfully in place by the black horror. Apparently the news is good, and the bones are now set correctly, because he grabs an osteo-regenerator from the equipment cart and straps it in place over Jim’s hand to start the repair.

“Stay,” he says. “Lie down, relax. Anything feels weird, you yell for someone, or press the red button. I’ll be back in a bit to check on you.”

“Thanks, doc,” Jim says, only half-mocking, as McCoy ducks around the curtain and disappears. Really, he’s had much worse run-ins with the medical profession. Or run-of-the-mill run-ins with much worse medical professionals, maybe. And that McCoy guy is kinda hot. That gruff thing really works for him, makes a guy wonder what it would take to make him smile or laugh or pay a compliment.

As Jim lowers himself gingerly to lie on the uncomfortable surface of the bio-bed, he resolves to see more of this particular doc. Maybe even…

“Kid? You still breathing?”

It takes Jim an alarmingly long time to wake enough to figure out what’s going on and where the hell he is. He yawns. “Guess I—kinda nodded off there, huh, Doc?”

“Seems that way. Any nausea, blurred vision, racing heart, shortness of breath? Any concerning symptoms at all?”

Jim resists the obvious joke about swellings in his pants. He doesn’t think their epic friendship has quite reached that level yet. Especially since he hasn’t informed the guy about their epic friendship yet. He does a quick internal survey, makes sure everything feels present and correct. “Nothing to report, Doc.” He sits up awkwardly, swings his legs back over the side. “Just tenderness from the shoulder and woozy from the drugs.”

He only remembers about his hand when McCoy starts stripping the gear from it. Guess _that_ treatment worked splendidly.

“So, am I free to go?”

“Sure, kid—”

“Jim.”

“Sure, Kid Jim. But see you take it easy for a few days. I’ll put a note in your file to that effect, if necessary.”

“I’ll be good. But you’re welcome to keep a very close eye on me, Doc.” He doesn’t wink, makes do with the classic Kirk smirk.

McCoy, disappointingly, shows no obvious reaction, just starts bundling him back into his red cadet’s jacket and lecturing him about what he can and can’t do with regard to over-the-counter pain relief in the next couple days. But it’s not all _that_ disappointing, Jim finds. Because, competence? Is totally hot. And this McCoy dude is competent from the tips of his doctorly fingertips to the thinky look in his brown eyes. Not to mention the old-fashioned stethoscope hanging half out of his jeans pocket. Jim isn’t going to forget this little encounter in a hurry.

***

The second time, Jim has succeeded, via a cunning week-long strategy of wheedling, whining, cajoling, and imploring, in getting McCoy to come out with him for a drink. And it’s awesome. McCoy grumbles about the club, questions Jim’s spectacularly unimpeachable taste, and then goes all post-orgasmic and quiet right after he gets his first taste of the good bourbon they keep under the bar. After reminding himself sternly that McCoy probably isn’t the sort to go for a first date leaning against a dirty alley wall with his dick down Jim’s throat, Jim settles down to enjoy the view and the company. Contrary to popular opinion, he and his dick can be patient.

“How about we go back to your place for… coffee?” Jim suggests as they’re pulling on their jackets against the evening chill a couple of hours later. It’s good to be able to use his sexier tones and be reasonably confident they’ll register now with the thumping bass-beats fading into the distance as they walk.

For a moment, in the unwholesome dim glare of the streetlights, Jim’s sure McCoy is giving him the sort of sultry once-over that virtually guarantees—

“Nah, Jim, I’ve got early rounds, then some stupid Bolian anatomy practical, and a two-hour exam on early Federation history. And that’s just before lunch.”

The words sound like _wish I could, but I can’t tonight_ , but the tone reads as flat out _not interested_. Jim doesn’t have the first clue what to make of that. They walk on, and Jim tries not to mope at this obvious failure of his mojo.

McCoy is apparently so unassumingly awesome that Starfleet’s big medical brass are still finding ways to cosy up to him. The latest is a transfer of accommodations from a ground-floor suite in the medical dorms, sharing bathroom and kitchen facilities with three others, to a rather nice one-bedroom apartment right on the edge of campus. Which means Jim at least gets the pleasure of escorting him to his door, since the building’s on his route back to his own crowded three-bed dorm room.

“Goodnight, man,” he says, clapping McCoy’s arm possibly a bit hard because it’s costing him to resist kissing the bastard.

McCoy smiles, just a little. “Next time, I pick the bar.” And he enters the security code and steps into his building, leaving Jim kinda wishing he _had_ kissed him and to hell with the possible subsequent face-slapping.

***

The third time, he’s too horny for the subtlety of which, despite public opinion, he is oh so totally capable. He’s wormed his way into McCoy’s heart, and they’re getting so close that he’s considering various nicknames for the man. Because, _Leonard_? So he’s lying there on the sofa, which is seriously old but, provided you avoid the one dodgy spring, also seriously comfortable, contemplating how much effort it would take to lift his head enough to drink some more of his beer. And how good it would feel to get his cock sucked right now. He glances over at Hands—healing hands, geddit? Yeah, Jim doesn’t think it’s all that hot either—who is having a disagreement with his padd about some aspect of some random species’ physiology or something.

“Hey, McCoy, man?”

Grumble.

“I totally need to get laid. Today. You interested?”

McCoy’s gaze flicks up to take Jim in. “No, thank you,” he says, rather primly, and narrows his eyes.

Jim decides he’ll have to reassess. Perhaps his new friend is, like, old-fashionedly straight or something?

***

“Geez,” Jim breathes, “would you _look_ at that.”

Big Cat (Leo—lion—see?) does, in fact, look at the spectacular example of total masculine HOTNESS currently jogging shirtless across the main quad. And Jim looks at him. And Big Cat there is _not_ looking at Half-Naked Jogging Guy in an unaffected, academic, heterosexual kinda way. He’s looking at HNJG like he realised just as fast as Jim did exactly how much that guy needs to be licked from his navel right on down.

And this is good, because it is evidence that BC doesn’t only like women, which is a relief. On the other hand, men who like men, as a rule, like Jim, even if all they want to do is shut their eyes and imagine he’s hairier or a redhead or whatever. Unattached guys don’t generally turn down offers of safe, no-strings, hot sex. So what could possibly make Jim unattractive to BC, given that BC clearly recognises how sincerely HNJG needs a blowjob right now?

Does he need to work out more?

Does he need to sweat more?

Does he need to be shirtless more?

Jim can do these things, yes, yes, and yes.

***

McCoy grumbles about all the bad, painful things that can happen when you overdo it in the gym.

McCoy complains that Jim, having worked up a healthy sweat running laps of the campus, stinks and is dripping on his clean floor.

McCoy scoffs at Jim’s impressive shirtlessness and makes snide remarks about it being cold in here.

Jim pouts. Handsomely, of course.

***

Around the beginning of their second semester at the Academy, Jim gives up on the plan to get Bones (because he grumbled too loudly about sticks and stones and broken bones while admonishing Jim over his inability to commit to a nickname or, you know, just use a man’s goddamn real name like a non-idiot) into bed. Enough failures, and it only makes sense to switch into opportunistic mode. He’s still totally ready to spring into action should an opportunity present itself, but meanwhile can turn his scheming planning tactical talents that are going to make him an awesome captain one day towards winning the hearts and hot bods of people who might actually sleep with him in the short-term. So he dates a delightfully limber gymnast who is training to work in photon torpedo research and spends his Bones-related hours being the bestest friend he can be. Because he likes being a friend, and having one. It’s been a while since he trusted anyone this much. Even if Bones is a crabby bastard with a sharp tongue and a way of giving you the finger without actually, you know, so much as lifting a finger. It’s all in the glare, man. They wouldn’t need phasers anymore if starships could only be equipped with industrial strength Bones Glares.

So he’s a good friend when some of Bones’s immediate, and jealous, supervisors in the medical track try to tell Bones that he needs to retake courses whose equivalents he passed with flying colours during his pre-med or med school training, or that Ole Miss isn’t rigorous enough in such and such and he’ll have to take a class. Jim has it on good authority that the Powers That Be of Starfleet itself _love_ Bones, plus he’s seen it for himself. So he goes in to bat for his buddy, whispers words in the right ears, leaves small gifts on the right desks, hacks into the right email accounts to see who’s saying what, and reads every rulebook he can find in search of exploitable technicalities. He is _awesome_ and, ultimately, Bones ends up not with extra classes but with one fewer.

Bones reads the message containing the good news aloud, while Jim bounces on his toes by the window and gives up all hope of looking innocent.

“You wouldn’t happen to know anything about this sudden turnaround, would you, Jim?”

“You might very well think that, Bones, but I couldn’t possibly comment.”

The Bones brows attempt a baleful rendezvous. “ _Right._ ”

Jim waves breezily. “So, you wanna celebrate?”

Bones thinks about this. Slowly, a smile starts appearing around his eyes, tugging at the corners of his mouth. Jim can’t help but grin at the sight. He loves the challenge of cracking through Bones’s layer of permafrost.

“Why don’t you put the game on?” Bones says after a moment, pointing in the general direction of his entertainment unit. “I’ll get us some drinks.”

So they drink Bones’s bourbon and watch a football game (with Andorian cheerleaders for the away team, _very_ cool), and Jim can’t recall the last time anything so simple was so much fucking _fun_. Despite initial impressions to the contrary, Bones is all kinds of awesome.

***

Bones is playing loud, rockified vintage country music when Jim lets himself in one chilly day soon after their first awesome on-campus Christmas break. He looks happy, for once, which suits Jim’s mood perfectly.

“Hey!” Jim yells, and the computer automatically adjusts the volume down so they can hear each other. “Good day?”

Bones turns from the window he’s been gazing out of. “Spotted a misdiagnosed alien patient at Starfleet Medical. He’ll live, now. Jones has had to stop making noises about how I’m a hick who don’t know shit about alien biology.”

Jim grins, dances across the room, and hugs him, hard. “And I passed first responder training, thanks to you. Top of the fucking class.”

“Suppose I couldn’t ask for better than that,” Bones growls in his ear, completely deadpan. One of his hands pats awkwardly at Jim’s back. Jim doesn’t miss that the other is sliding slowly but surely towards his ass.

Jim pulls back a little to look at him. Bones’s gaze is serious, intent, and he isn’t smiling. And then, slowly, so slowly, he’s leaning forwards, tilting his head to one side so their noses don’t collide. And then Jim can feel warm breath on his lips, and Bones’s big hand squeezing his ass, and they’re kissing, tentative but hot and with a definite thrum of urgency Jim’s quite sure isn’t just him. Jim can’t help his small moan as he opens his mouth, accepts the intrusion of Bones’s tongue, suddenly greedy. Bones tastes amazing, feels amazing, all broad and solid and perfect. It’s a rush to kiss someone and not have to bend or crane—how long since he’s been with someone pretty much his own height?

“Jim,” Bones breathes, in between kisses. He’s worked a hand up under Jim’s uniform, and even though Jim knows a little something about nerve concentrations in the back he’d swear he can feel each individual fingertip that connects him to Bones. They’re both panting, and the computer’s turned the music right off since they’re talking so quietly.

He pushes, until Bones’s butt is pressed against the hip-height window ledge and he can’t back up any more. Nibbles Bones’s sexy lower lip and runs a hand through his hair. This isn’t a time to be ripping off clothing, this is a time to savour. And _fuck_ , Jim wants to savour. He’s wanted this so fucking _long_ , it’s not even longing anymore. It’s damn near pining. He wants Bones. Their tongue-tips flicker and touch and shy away, and those capable surgeon’s hands slide up and down Jim’s body, restless, exploring. Bones smells warm and male, and that more than anything is doing it for Jim. That and the bulge of an erection pressing against him.

And then, all of a sudden, Bones goes still. Jim releases his totally lickable lips, confused, to lean back a little and study his face. His cheeks are flushed, and he’s not quite looking at Jim. He swallows visibly.

“I… can’t,” Bones says, voice strained and very, very Georgia. “I really can’t.” And before Jim can quite make sense of that, Bones has pushed and wriggled out of his grasp and gone to lock himself in the bathroom.

Jim stares stupidly out the window, unsure what just happened or what he should do next. The view--of paths and green lawn and occasional red- or grey-uniformed people on their way somewhere, usually in a hurry--is not wonderfully forthcoming with answers. He has a serious lack of relevant facts here. He doesn’t even know whether Bones would respond positively to a fact-finding mission or whether he should just go before his buddy emerges.

In the end, he waits, because it will mess with his head too much otherwise. He needs all the clues he can get to whatever the hell just happened, ASAP. So he adjusts himself in his pants, then helps himself to the bourbon and the sofa.

He’s managed to sink pretty deep into the cushions, and one finger into his glass, by the time the door opens again.

Bones freezes, one foot on either side of the bathroom threshold, when he spots Jim. He looks… wound tight. Brittle. Jim slides a glass across the coffee table towards him, and Bones stares at it for several seconds before nodding shortly and coming to take it. He sits, puts his elbows on his knees, and stares into his drink.

“I don’t do sex with men,” Bones announces at last. “It’s for the best.” And he drains his glass, sets it down on the table, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “Sorry, Jim. I think you should go.”

Jim ponders that word choice for a moment, then finishes his drink and clambers to his feet. Bones looks so sad with his head hanging like that. “You’re okay, right?”

“I’m fine, Jim.”

The silence is actually kinda painful. But Jim doesn’t really have a lot of choice here. The guy looks so wrecked that it would feel inhumane to push right now. His answers will just have to wait. “Okay,” he says. “See you in class.” And he makes for the door.

His last sight of Bones, from the corridor as he closes the door, is of him stretching out on the sofa, head on one padded arm and ankles crossed over the other, more bourbon in the glass he’s resting on his stomach, as the computer reinstates the mournful, but fast, country music.

***

Despite this setback, Jim lets his gymnast know it isn’t going to work out and she should totally pursue that hot Andorian chick who’s been admiring her ass in class. It’s a smooth, gentle let-down, and he doesn’t think she hates him for it.

He wouldn’t be surprised if she’s noticed his kinda-sorta thing for Bones.

***

They only have the one class together this semester, a super-boring introduction to how not to fuck up _too_ completely when introduced to people from other cultures. So Jim doesn’t actually see Bones for several days. But, when the day rolls around and he shows up to class fashionably late, he finds that Bones has saved his usual seat for him, which is such a little thing and yet kinda makes Jim want to dance a jig on the nearest desktop. The lecturer starts droning on about how Vulcans don’t handshake, and Jim sits, bouncing and fidgeting on his folding lecture room chair. He wants to ask Bones if they’re cool, but if they _are_ cool or even just cool-ish, asking will draw attention to the reasons why perhaps they ought not to be cool. And if they’re not cool, Bones probably thinks Jim damn well ought to know it. So he just waits for some kind of sign from Bones, and tries not to feel guilty. Because Bones started it. Bones kissed _him_.

They get through class okay, and troop off to the mess for one of their thrice-daily servings of allegedly-nutritious slop, and it’s nice just to stand in the tray line with his friend and listen to the grumbles about expecting people to perform at peak efficiency on this crap. The fruit’s good, though, and Bones makes Jim take extras like he always does. Bones heads to their usual table by the window, and Jim slides onto the bench only to have Bones slide a few inches away.

_Huh._

“Do I smell bad or something?” He tries to make it a joke, pulls an amusing face while sniffing his armpit completely un-surreptitiously.

“Can’t complain,” Bones says, examining his utensils for cleanliness before digging into his baked beans.

Jim tries to let it go, he really does. Only… Well, he doesn’t fucking like the implications, okay? And sometimes he’d rather have a full-scale fight than uncertainty, you know?

“You just moved away from me, Bones. Was I sitting too close to you? Making you uncomfortable? Were you worried all the little kiddie cadets would think we’re in loooove?”

Bones gives him a look that is, surprisingly, more guilty than angry. With a side order of pleading. It’s unsettling, and makes Jim swallow his follow-up remark about cooties. “Guess I owe you an explanation. But later, all right?”

Jim relaxes a little. “When?”

Bones shrugs. “I’m on clinic duty until curfew. But I’m free from 1900 tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow it is, then. And in the meantime—”

“In the meantime,” says Bones, firmly, “eat your mysterious meatloaf _and_ your goddamn sorry excuse for mashed potato.”

Jim salutes, and his smile comes back out of hiding.

***

Bones is just getting out of the shower when Jim lets himself in at 1912. He looks good in a towel, better toned than Jim might have guessed, and a whole lot less self-conscious than he would have suspected. Actually, he doesn’t seem to mind Jim looking at all. Curiouser and curiouser.

“‘M gonna get dressed,” he says, idly scratching at his navel. Jim is, just briefly, mesmerised. “Grab us a couple of beers, would you? Oh, and there’s a pizza on the way. Already paid for.”

“Got it,” Jim says. But he doesn’t actually make for the little kitchenette until he has properly savoured the sight of a towel-clad Bones, all damp and hairy-legged, disappearing into his bedroom.

_Damn._

***

“So,” Jim says, when the silence is getting awkward and the pizza’s getting cold because neither one of them has reached for it. “You don’t do men, huh?”

Bones shakes his head, once.

“But you have, in the past?”

A shrug that definitely doesn’t mean no. Jim nudges his friend’s bare foot with his sneaker. Bones turns to him, then. He looks miserable.

“Drink something,” Jim suggests, “then just… blurt it all out. Am I making any sense?”

Bones gives his emphatic little nod, grabs his beer and takes a swig. Jim can’t help but watch his throat work as he swallows. “I’m like an addict,” he says, and doesn’t pause for breath. “Sex with men is just too damn tempting for me. Overwhelming. Once I start I can’t…. Put me in a room with a naked, aroused man and I ain’t got any self-control to speak of. It’s what destroyed my marriage. I can’t risk giving in again.”

 _Okay,_ Jim decides. _There’s totally a story here—probably a weird one that makes even less sense than what Bonesy just said—and we’re sure as hell going to need more than beer._

***

“So,” Jim says again, when they’ve broken out the hard liquor and Bones still isn’t talking. “You don’t strike me as the cheating type. What happened?”

Bones slumps further back into the sofa cushions, stretches out his legs. “Got married real young. Too young. Pretty soon, we figured out we each had… interests the other couldn’t easily satisfy. Hers were what are commonly described as kinks. Mine… weren’t.” He swallows visibly.

“You’d never done anything with guys before,” Jim prods gently.

“Nope. But all of a sudden, I was looking. Seemed like overnight the whole town had filled up with gorgeous men.” For a moment he looks fondly wistful, like he’s remembering a particular scene in vivid detail. “I had no intention of doing anything about it,” he adds darkly, “but my wife had other ideas. She wanted us both sexually satisfied, even if that meant augmenting what we had together.” He pauses, looks at his glass, doesn’t drink. Clears his throat. “So the arrangement was, every Saturday night, Joanna stayed with relatives or friends so Joss and I could play. One of us would have the house for the night, the other’d go out. We’d alternate.”

He goes thoughtful again, doesn’t seem to be about to speak. Jim reaches out, gives Bones’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “So where’d you go?”

A shrug. “Bars. Clubs. The all-night library. It didn’t much seem to matter, I could always seem to find someone.”

“That’s ‘cause you’re pretty, Bones.”

He scoffs. “Easy, more like.” He drinks, wipes his mouth, tilts his head up as if the ceiling holds answers. “It worked well, really. I even got kinda used to bein’ woken up on Saturday morning by a horny wife who wanted to tell me all about her plans for the evening while she’s riding me.” His eyes close, and he sighs, clearly remembering.

“And what did she get up to Saturday nights, your wife?”

Bones smiles, rather sadly. “A gentleman doesn’t reveal that sort of thing.” He finishes his drink and does not immediately refill, which Jim thinks is a good sign. Probably. “Anyway, to cut a long story short—”

“Must we?”

Bones glares but ignores the interruption. “—One day Joss comes home Saturday night, having forgotten something of world-shaking importance in our bedroom.” He barely pauses to breathe, seems determined to get it all out in a rush. “I’m a bit busy, with company, but she says she’ll just be in and out. So I groan and say all right. And Joss comes in, sees me wrapped around this beautiful, beautiful man who’s fucking me slow and jerky because we can’t actually seem to stop. She stares at me for a minute, then grabs her stuff and goes. Later on, while my friend is showering, I find her downstairs at the dining table researching Georgia divorce law.” He blinks rapidly, several times, clears his throat. “She told me—she told me she’d never seen me so into anything in the whole course of our marriage. Said she clearly wasn’t what or who I wanted and she’d made a mistake thinking we could supplement our sex life with other people. That she’d seen the truth of my sexuality now, and she couldn’t ask me to deny it. Said she was fine with us having extras on the side, but this made her feel like _she_ was the frivolous extra. She said—”

Bones makes an odd, gulping noise, and goes silent.

Jim itches with the need to hug him, to hold him close and comfort him in whatever way he can. And then to slap him round the ears until he sees some fucking sense, because some of this stuff sounds _kinda_ woolly. “Maybe you just liked getting fucked,” he suggests, as gently as he can. “You ever try that with your wife?”

Bones nods and slumps some more. “We tried everything, those last few months. Trying to keep it together. But apparently it wasn’t the same. My eyes didn’t light up. I wasn’t _lost in it._ She said… She suggested that being with her, being with women, is an intellectual choice I made because I’m in less emotional danger from the fairer sex. That it’s a kind of dishonesty, denying what I really want.” He gives a horrid, wounded laugh, as if he’s far from believing that.

Jim’s confused. “So you’re, what, punishing all the hot guys of the world because a hot guy was there the day your marriage started to crumble?”

Bones shakes his head rapidly but doesn’t appear able to find words.

“What, then? You’re trying to prove you don’t need it? Don’t need hot sex?”

“I told you. It’s something I can’t control. I get one taste, and I just can’t stop.”

“But—”

“Jim.” All of a sudden, he sounds like a man at the end of his tether. “I’ve explained as well as I can. That’s all I can give you.” He sends Jim a grim look, giving the distinct impression that, at least for now, this line of conversation is over. But at least he reaches out for a slice of pizza, starts eating.

Jim follows suit. He’s starving, man. And he’s gotta keep his energy up, what with the way the gears in his brain have begun madly whirling.

***

Jim really does not know how to reconcile two very significant facts. One, Bones has said _no_. Two, Bones is being an idiot. This makes it very difficult to decide whether he should a) exit the situation gracefully, fuck other people, and never mention it again, b) attempt to talk him around, or c) jump his Bones.

Jim being Jim, he attacks it like a tactical problem in a command track examination simulation, thinks about it for a couple weeks, and eventually comes up with option d). Which is to be Captain Subtle. Captain Subtle of the Excellent Ass, oh yes.

The procedure will run thusly:

1) a short period during which Jim will be the absolute Best of Breed example of a bestest buddy ever, in order to lull Bones into a dubious sense of security regarding Jim’s intentions.  
2) a sustained (and Subtle) campaign to bring to Bones’s attention all the hot man-flesh that is to be seen and possibly even bumped into around campus, thus hopefully rebooting the man’s gaydar and making him exquisitely conscious of how much he wants to do hot men.  
3) some kind of carefully orchestrated event in a safe and private location designed to heighten Bones’s awareness of what his no-men diet is costing him. The leading possibility Jim's considering entails somehow persuading Bones to join him in watching a nice porno. The kind with women. And then encouraging a jerk-off session. Or at least jerking off himself, and seeing if he can’t get Bones to watch him instead of the wailing banshee women on Sex Pollen Sexcapades 14 or something.  
4) cooling off period designed to get Bones to think and reflect and psychoanalyse himself  
5) Bones having some kind of sexual contact with a man. Jim totally volunteers to blow or be blown for this part. He’s selfless like that.  
6) Bones realises that the world has not ended. He may require help with this part, on account that he can be a complete doofus at times.  
7) hopefully, hot cathartic man sex during which Bones realises that he can never be happy without access to the wonderful vistas of man-on-man lovin’.

As plans go, Jim’s achieved more with sketchier. He gives himself official permission to proceed.

Jim is absolute A-grade prime best friend for three weeks. Putting things in discrete mental boxes comes easily to him. There are boxes marked “Tarsus” and “Frank”, for instance, and, provided he gives each its due, taking it down off the shelf to think about its contents every day or two, nothing in there distracts him while he’s trying to do other things. So, now he’s made a new box and labelled it “Bones is a sexy motherfucker and I want to lick him all over”, and he dutifully thinks about these things for a few minutes a day while lying in bed or standing under the shower spray (or, you know, both; some things require more... frequent... examination to avoid becoming distractions at inappropriate moments), and then when he’s with Bones he can be totally 100% Platonic Friend Guy untroubled by those ideas.

They do one of their awesome weekend study benders, which aren’t as good as _real_ benders seeing as they’re more about the study and the food and the quiet company than the partypartyparty and getting so drunk you love the whole world even as you’re tripping over it, but it’s fun in its way. And the memory of recent events in Bones’s room, recent awkward conversations, is nothing but a faint buzz in the back of Jim’s mind.

They shoot some hoops the following Sunday on one of the courts the Academy Powers That Be, in their infinite wisdom, have scattered about the campus more or less at random, as if compelled to set opportunities for exercise every few hundred metres so no cadet can possibly forget the need for physical fitness. Bones is pretty good, and far more interested in the game against Jim than in the game against the hoop. They work up a sweat in the late afternoon sun, and Jim rolls with it, filing away images of a dancing, dodging, jumping, shirtless Bones for some later time when he’ll have leisure to appreciate them. Then half a dozen of their fellow cadets descend, and suddenly they’re opposing team captains, and Jim’s competitive streak pulls the game into sharp, narrow focus. Bones loses, but laughs anyway, and that’s music to Jim’s ears.

In all, Jim is quite possibly the world’s best best friend for a period of twenty-one days, and you can bet he congratulates himself appropriately for this feat. But then he tires of the Captain Subtle plan and starts looking for opportunities to improvise.

***

“Bones,” Jim says, while faithfully stirring the bowl of pecan pie batter he’s been lumped with, “when you were with guys, was it, like, one at a time, or did you view the male half of the human race as an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord deal?”

Bones glares at him. He’s still holding the egg whisk he was cleaning and the effect is somehow rather menacing. Bones is a doctor, he probably knows sixteen ways to kill a man using only an egg whisk. “We’re not talking about that.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t wish to discuss it, Jim, that’s why.”

“Why?”

“What are you, a toddler?”

“Nah, Bones. Just your best friend who’s worried about you.”

Bones snorts and goes back to the washing up. But, eventually, he speaks. “Serial short-term relationships mostly. Broke ‘em off if it seemed like feelings might develop. Why?”

Jim shrugs, stops to check the ancient hand-written recipe to see what this batter stuff is supposed to look like when he’s done with it. Decides it’s good enough and sets it down. “Because I’m not clear why you think starting something with me might set you off running amuck, getting on your knees for anyone with a dick, and spending so long chasing hot ass that you forget to turn in your assignments.”

Jim blinks, startled, at the sound of Bones banging both hands hard against the kitchenette bench. “Damnit, kid, you haven’t seen me when I’m like that.”

“No, I haven’t,” Jim replies, as coolly as he can manage. He _is_ command track, after all. He’s supposed to be able to talk through problems without creating more. “What are you like? Desperate? Insatiable?”

“Yes, damn it!”

“So?”

“What the hell do you mean, so?”

Sometimes, Jim reflects, it’s really tempting just to tackle this man to the ground and give him a mighty good kissing. Probably do them both a world of good. “So how do you know that’s not just what you’re like, when you’re in a new relationship with someone you dig? We all go a little bit crazy when we start lusting after someone, you know. And if you’re with a woman, but it’s men you’re really most attracted to, of course you’re going to notice a difference in the, I don’t know, the strength of the pull or whatever.”

Bones is staring out the window over the sink. Jim can see his faint, translucent reflection in the pseudo-glass, gazing off into the distance like some troubled hero from an old-school western. “Just—just leave it, kid. You don’t get it.”

This makes Jim unaccountably sad, and Jim Kirk does _not_ like feeling sad. It makes him reckless, reckless enough to go over, press his body against his Bones’s back and loop his arms around his chest. It’s surprisingly comfortable, at least for Jim.

“No, I don’t understand,” he murmurs in his friend’s ear. “I don’t understand why you think catastrophe will ensue if you let me kiss you, blow you, fuck you. I don’t understand why I can’t have those things, and I _really_ don’t understand why you have to miss out too. You’ve got no more marriages to destroy here, and you couldn’t drive me away if you tried. What’s to risk? You can say stop any time and I’ll stop, Bones, you know I will. So why not experiment, indulge a bit until that point comes? Why not enjoy what I can give you? You know I can do no-strings if that’s what you want. But, damn it, Bones, I can totally tie you up in all the strings you want if that’s what you want. I can be commitment guy. You’re worth that. You’re so worth it.”

And that, Jim thinks, may just be the biggest speech about His Feelings he’s ever made in his whole damn life, and that includes the counselling they made him get after the Car+Quarry Incident.

And Bones just… stands there. Not moving, not squirming, not pushing Jim away, but not relaxing back against him, either.

Eventually, Jim can’t take it anymore. He knows he won’t deal well with the guilt if he pushes any further. So he resists the impulse to plant a kiss on some reachable part of Bones, simply releases him, steps away, turns to go.

He’s half expecting to be called back, but isn’t surprised when it doesn’t happen. In actual fact, he finds himself faintly relieved. Whatever might go down from here on in, he’s damn sure he wants Bones to have thought it through properly, not just jumped in blindly in true James T. Kirk fashion. He just wishes this was all a little bit easier, especially on Bones. Holy _sol_ , that man deserves a fucking break. He lets himself out quietly and doesn’t look back.

***

He wakes next morning to a text-only communication from Bones.

_You don’t half scare me sometimes, kid. LHM._

Jim finds that rather comforting.

***

He doesn’t actually see Bones until the next day, in the cadets’ mess at lunch. It feels like a moderately huge weight has been lifted off his shoulders when the guy doesn’t shift away the instant Jim sits down. So they sit there, knees just brushing, and pick at their trays with their usual indifference. It’s nice.

“Summer,” Bones says abruptly, as he’s reaching for his they-claim-it’s-apple-juice-but-reasonable-people-may-differ-on-that. “What are you doing?”

Jim shrugs. “Summer school, mainly.”

“But you’ll get a week off before?”

Jim frowns. “Like twelve days, I think.”

Bones gives that incredibly emphatic nod of his, as if something has just been firmly settled. “Good. We’ll go someplace. And try some of those things you talked about. And if I don’t like who I am at the end of it, then we leave all that behind us, you get that?”

Jim’s struggling not to smile. Vacation? With Bones? Sexy naked vacation with Bones? _Awesome_ , in any language. And he’s damn sure he can convince Bones to embrace the man-love. Just fucking watch him.

***

Jim resorts to acquiring an old-fashioned calendar purposely for the pleasure of physically crossing off the days until he gets to be alone with Bones and allowed to take advantage of that fact. For now, it’s understood that he’s to keep his hands to himself. But he can deal with that, considering the light at the end of the tunnel. Which is so gloriously bright that Jim has no qualms whatever about turning down the distinctly fuckable Cadet Mitchell when he makes a pass. Which he does while Jim is sitting with Bones on the lawn outside the astrophysics building, study materials spread out all around them. Bones glowers adorably at Mitchell’s pert, retreating backside. And if Jim’s shoulder happens to brush Bones’s when he turns to make his pithy remark, well, Bones doesn’t say anything about it. And he stays close.

***

For a man who’s scared of shuttles and suspicious of transporters, Bones sure seems keen to get them as far away from home as logistically possible for their little sex break. For their summer vacation, Bones has decided (drum-roll, please) that they shall spend seven days and nights in a lakeside resort in Queenstown (Jim tactfully doesn’t mention the time he was almost sent to a rather different part of New Zealand, only the judge changed her mind at the last minute), a very short drive from the ski-fields of Coronet Peak.

Trust Bones to choose to spend summer vacation in, well, winter.

But Jim understands, he really does. The idea is to have a period of time he can easily fence off in his memory. Something he can later pretend was just some kind of fantasy idyll or dream. Something exotic, set safely apart from his everyday life.

Jim tries and fails to imagine Bones actually skiing. Or snowboarding. Or going anywhere near actual, deeper-than-the-inch-or-two-they-get-down-in-Georgia-per-annum snow, frankly, unless it’s to grumble about how other people will catch their death if they’re not careful or die gruesomely in avalanches if they sneeze funny.

But that’s okay, Jim thinks, watching Bones hunker down to begin unpacking his essentials, dark denim shaping his beautiful ass beautifully. They didn’t exactly come for the skiing.

“I’m gonna hit the showers,” Bones says, pulling Jim from his daydreams.

He looks nervous. Very, very nervous. Jim gives what he hopes is a reassuring smile. “Relax, Bones.” He keeps his tone light with an effort. “We don’t have to do anything.”

Bones rolls his eyes, as if there are no words for how completely Jim has missed the point.

Jim decides it might be wise to take his boots off right about now.

***

Jim’s still tapping at the room’s computer, reading up on the hotel and its restaurant and how late they can eat food made by actual humans when Bones emerges from the bathroom, wearing only a towel. He barely has time to eye this gorgeous specimen of near-naked humanity up and down and begin fishing around for something nice and supportive and reassuring to say before Bones is on him, full force, bearing him back against the wall and kissing him with rough, panting eagerness.

Although he’s surprised at the, er, enthusiasm of Bones’s approach, Jim Kirk is approximately 974 kilometres from objecting to being suddenly up close and personal with all that lovely bare skin. Just _watch_ him not fucking object, man.

They kiss, deep and wet and desperate, and there’s absolutely no sign of hesitation from Bones this time. Jim groans, runs his hands up the broad expanse of bare, smooth back, feels the muscles of Bones’s shoulders and upper arms work as he tightens his embrace. He decides that all those gym hours Bones insists on squeezing into their busy schedules every week are totally, completely, one hundred fucking percent justified, oh yes.

“You’re going to get naked,” Bones growls in Jim’s ear while he’s carelessly ripping open a damn nice shirt. “You’re going to sit on the bed, and I’m gonna blow you ‘til you’re about ready to pop.”

“Yeah?” Jim breathes. “Then what?” He shudders as his left nipple gets pinched.

“Then you’re going to fuck me, of course.”

The words are oh so commanding, but the tone makes it almost a plea. Jim can’t help his smirk as he drops his hands to unbutton his jeans.

 

He fancies he can actually hear Leonard McCoy’s mouth watering as he steps out of his jeans. He poses appropriately to emphasise the utter inadequacy of his briefs to contain the eighth wonder of the world, Mt. Jimtacular.

Bones snorts. “You’re so damn full of yourself, kid. It’s disgusting.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jim simpers. “But don’t worry, you’ll be full of me soon enough.”

He doesn’t get scolded for the awful line. In fact, Bones’s gaze skips from hot to feral, and before Jim knows it he’s been shoved down to perch on the edge of the bed with Bones kneeling between his knees, working his underwear down his legs and, apparently, very much enjoying the manly musky scent of Jim’s manly musky dick. The briefs land on the floor by the crumpled pile of his favourite jeans, and then Bones is making an odd, faint whining noise in the instant before he pounces.

However long it’s been, he hasn’t lost the knack, Jim thinks dazedly, as Bones sucks him down surprisingly deep and gets to work. A clever hand tickles at Jim’s balls, then just behind, and Bones makes eye contact for one long, hot moment before his eyelids flutter closed and he starts to bob his head in a slow, teasing rhythm. Jim’s higher brain functions pretty much go into standby mode in favour of yummy mindless pleasure.

Jesus _Christ_ on an _ice-cream truck_.

It’s nice to focus on a BJ for its own sake, not just as a way to reach an orgasm. And focus Jim would, indubitably, if he weren’t so distracted by the view (oh, man, Bones sucking dick. Bones sucking _his_ dick) and the sounds and every little unexpected sensation as Bones slurps away like Jim’s dick is a treat he’s been denied far too long. Which isn’t that far from the truth.

Jim isn’t sure what to do with his hands, and they wander incessantly from Bones’s hair to his shoulders to his lips, wet and stretched around cock. For the most part he keeps his eyes open, trying to commit every detail to memory, though it gets hard not to throw back his head and surrender to the moment when Bones starts to hum, just idly like he’s not even thinking about it, like his enjoyment of what he’s doing just won’t be contained.

The pleasure ramps up fast, and Jim’s fingers tighten involuntarily on the broad shoulders he’s been kneading. He groans as he pushes Bones urgently away, earning a smug, knowing look for his efforts. Jim lunges down, seizes the towel and pulls. Childish, he knows, but it leaves the guy both beautifully confused and beautifully naked, man. It’s a little known fact that Jim’s a big fan of naked.

For a moment, as he admires all that beautiful bare skin, and hairy thighs, and, yeah, fucking awesome slightly leftward-curved Bones cock, Jim seriously ponders the merits of them rolling around on the floor in all their naked glory. But knowing his luck he’d injure an elbow or something and Bones would mock him and that’d be five minutes lost when they could be having fun. So instead he offers his arm, clasps his friend’s elbow as Bones clasps his, hauls him up and then down on top of him as Jim lies back. It’s an effort to keep from wriggling, from rubbing his needy dick against any handy Bonesy body part, but he doesn’t think he can do that and not come, like, right away.

“A-ha! Got ya where I want ya, Bonseybones.”

“That right?” Bones growls, and tickles him.

Which is completely not fair.

At all.

Bones is not supposed to know that Jim is ticklish. No one is supposed to know. It’s like a state secret of the Jim Kirk nation and shit. Somehow, the thought that perhaps it’s a lucky guess isn’t much consolation as Jim writhes and giggles helplessly beneath the fiendish onslaught of those wicked surgeon’s fingers.

“Gonna say ‘uncle’?” Bones enquires, after a while, loud enough to be heard over the noise of Jim's helpless laughter.

“Kinky, Bones, kinky—” he’s going to say more, but his laughing gear does not seem willing to repurpose for speech long-term.

Eventually, though—well, it _seems_ like it takes a couple of aeons, anyway—he manages to roll Bones under him, and that seems to sober Bones and his evil hands up immediately.

“There’s lube and things,” he says gruffly, gesturing with his head, “over there.”

And Jim abruptly loses his urge to revenge himself most deviously for the unprovoked and utterly unprincipled tickle attack on his noble person. He indicates with a suitably threatening glare that escape attempts should not be made, then crawls away to fetch the lube. Condoms, too, and little sachets of moist wipe-thingies, all laid out like ingredients for a really sexy cake. And he’s actually starting to feel a bit guilty, because Bones clearly put a lot of thought into planning this sex vacation of theirs, and all Jim did was restrict thinking of it to masturbation time and, yesterday, trouble himself to throw some clothes and stuff in a bag.

In those masturbatory fantasies, he might have envisaged more foreplay, a long, slow exploration of all that wonderful Bonesy flesh, experiments into nipple sensitivity and other potentially erogenous (or not) zones, a good full helping of driving Bones mad… But, hey, they have a week, and it’s not like all the exploration has to stop the second he gets his dick in the other guy, right? In fact, it’s really kinda--

“Jim?”

Bones, Jim notices abruptly, is actually trembling in his urgency to get fucked. So he smiles as he repositions Bones’s legs so he can easily brush at his hole, but it’s a softer, more reflective kind of mood that has him now.

Bones squeezes his eyes shut when Jim slides the first slick finger in, and sighs like he’d forgotten it all until now. Jim works him open, thorough, unhurried, feeling ridiculously imbued with responsibility here. He is _so_ gonna make this good for Bones, who’s taken so much trouble to get them here.

It seems to take forever, the slow slide of fingers into tight heat, the needy, half-smothered sounds Bones makes, the urgent need Jim’s managed to suppress so far but only just. And then Bones opens his mouth, and out falls—

“Damnit, Jim, are you gonna keep me waiting all fucking week?”

Jim snickers into Bones’s knee, then withdraws his hand and reaches for a condom packet. “So how’d you wanna do this?” he murmurs as he gets his dick all dolled up for the party.

“Just like this,” Bones whispers, suddenly unable to meet his gaze, and spreads his legs a little further in case Jim doesn’t quite get that he’s indicating missionary. Jim’s good with that, honest. There are people who are snobs about positions and techniques, people who see no value in the simple and the straightforward and the familiar, but in Jim's book that’s totally prizing form over function, style over substance, and every other cliche. That’s the sexual equivalent of writing a poem according to some arcane and archaic rhyme and rhythm scheme and not noticing that your poem has nothing to _say_. So he grins and gets on with it, stretching out over Bones, positioning himself. And, somehow, even the awesome rush of sensation as he starts working his cock into Bones’s tight ass pales in comparison to how it feels when Bones’s legs lock around him, when Bones looks up at him, blushing, eyes wide and bright, looking so fucking vulnerable, full of so much _longing_.

Jim moves, and they both groan.

Oh, _fucking hell_ , this is not going to last, Jim thinks desperately when his second rock into Bones fails on the gentleness front halfway through.

But then Bones’s head falls sideways, and something changes.

“You okay?” He leans down to press a quick kiss on that unbelievably sexy stubble the man has going on.

“Fine.”

But his voice is tight, strained. Jim peers down at him, concerned.

“Just—just fuck me already, would you?”

Jim does, but something’s changed, and he doesn’t like it. And a minute later, he realises he’s not enjoying it—well, not beyond the physical pleasure that comes of being deep inside someone. “Tell me.”

“It’s nothing.”

Jim has never, ever, not once in his life, withheld sex as a punishment or bargaining tool. But he pulls out now, sits up, rubs his face. Tries to puzzle out what’s going on in his favourite person’s head. Gets rid of the condom when his erection starts to fade in its virtuous efforts to allow his brain to function properly.

“Look,” Bones says, almost a growl, “maybe we could try a different position.”

To Jim’s ear, he sounds as if he really, really had his heart set on that one. “How come?”

“I—I just keep looking at the door and expecting her to walk in. This was how—” He gestures from himself to Jim.

Jim looks around, at the main door to their room. “The door was on that side, in your old place?”

“Uh huh.”

“Fine. Well, then we’ll turn around. Or, better still—” He gets up, goes over to the daybed thing by the little kitchen area. It isn’t bolted down or anything. “Give me a hand with this?”

Bones grumbles, but he does come to help. When it’s been shifted to Jim's satisfaction, and he’s installed an unimpressed-looking Bonesy back upon it, Jim’s rather satisfied with his genius. “Turn your head to the left,” he says.

Bones rolls his eyes, and makes a grand show of turning his head.

“What can you see?”

“Lake. Mountains. Sky.”

Jim smirks as he skips back to the bed to grab another condom. His dick, never one to be late for a hot date, is cheering up again already.

The sex is better for the delay, Bones calmer, Jim more relaxed. There’s only so many things that can go wrong, after all. He laughs when he finds the angle that makes Bones swear and clutch him harder. This is good, life is good, Bones is fucking awesome. And fucking Bones is, most definitely, also awesome.

They don’t kiss much, because Bones seems more interested in staring up at him like he’s trying to burn this experience into his mind forever, like he can’t really believe it’s happening, like it’s the best thing ever. Not exactly bad for a man’s ego, oh no.

Bones comes, well before Jim's even begun to think of helping him out, with a gasp and without a hand on his dick, body arching and flexing, gaze still locked on Jim’s face.

It’s the stare that does it, the way Bones keeps looking at his mouth, then meeting his gaze again, all fierce determination and need. Jim throws back his head, back bowing and toes curling with the force of his pleasure. So much longing, so much patience, finally paying off. It’s intense, bodily and brainily both. He rides it out, barely hearing Bones’s words of encouragement, quiet yet hoarse.

They lie there, panting. Jim’s half expecting the world to end, for some reason.

“Get off me,” Bones grumbles, breaking the moment. “You’re no lightweight, kid.”

The smile that invades Jim's whole face then feels as natural as breathing, as warm as spring sun.

***

There’s a hot tub on the balcony. They soak and stare at mountains. It’s quiet, and the air feels like it’s waiting for something.

“You always bottom?” Jim murmurs, lazily stroking his toes up and down his friend’s leg.

“Naw,” Bones drawls. “But that was the hardest thing to give up.”

Jim doesn’t believe that—well, he doesn’t believe that it’s acts as such that Bones gave up and that he’s missed. He thinks it’s about people, about the freedom to be oneself—that’s what Bones gave up, the not-getting-fucked part was merely a consequence. But he’s in no fit state to argue anything right now, the parts of his mind Bones didn’t blow having been mostly melted by the hot water by now. Besides, who wants to argue on their awesome sexcation?

“So, was it as good as you remembered?”

“ _Was it good for you, baby?_ Really, Jim? That all you got?”

“I was serious.” Jim’s pouting, and he knows it, but he’s confident it’s a handsome and endearing pout. And that Bones is currently too well-fucked to care, anyway. “And your Jim Kirk impression? Is terrible.”

Bones groans and throws a forearm theatrically up over his eyes, sinking down until his head rests against the edge of the tub and all but his head’s submerged. Really, it’s an appalling impression of a 1920s film starlet’s swoon. “It was better,” he says, like it’s an accusation. Like he’s expecting Jim to crow in triumph or something.

Jim smiles. He’s just getting _started_ on the awesome sex, man.

***

Jim’s very seldom crawled into someone’s bed with the intention of sleeping in their arms all night. So he’s prepared for the possibility that he’s shit at it.

But Bones? Bones was _married_. For, like, _years_. And really not all that long ago, though Jim doesn’t exactly have a lot of details about the workings and subsequent failing of the McCoy marriage. Still, it doesn’t escape Jim's notice that Bones has a hard time getting comfortable, and a harder time falling asleep. Jim’s woken several times from a light doze by his wriggling. He ends up volunteering Bones to be Little Spoon so he can surreptitiously pin him in place, to which the response is an unintelligible, but unprotesting, mumble. Jim breathes a sigh of relief and reaches for the sleepy place he keeps in his head, the place where there’s nothing to think about, nothing to distract from—

He’s woken some time after midnight (SF midnight, not local midnight) by Bones flailing, all elbows.

“Bones. Go. To. Sleep.”

The flailing stops. “Jim?”

Jesus, he’s forgotten who he’s in bed with? “Yeah, Bones. ‘S Jim. Sleepy Jim.”

Mister Flaily rolls over, pulling the duvet half off Jim, then abruptly rolls back.

This kinda thing has a definite tendency to promote unwanted wakefulness in one’s bedmate.

“Not good with strange beds,” Bones says at last. He’s turned to face Jim, and now he slips down off the pillow to press his forehead against Jim’s chest.

“Not strange bedfellows?”

The smack of an exaggerated kiss against his torso is apparently the only answer he’s going to get. But, hey, Jim’ll take it. He tangles their legs up and starts his mental relaxation routine.

***

Jim wakes up cold, with about six inches of available duvet. Investigation reveals that Bones had thoughtfully rolled over again at some point. Since, however, it appears to be dawn, which is something like lunchtime back in SF, Jim decides getting up might not be such a stupid idea.

He’s basking under the spray of the real water shower when Bones appears on the other side of the steam-swirled glass door. Dude looks groggy and disgruntled and sexy as hell, and also very, very naked, Jim grins and lets him in. Allowing Bones to pick the hotel has some definite advantages: this place is _roomy_. Jim watches with pleasure as Bones tips his head up to the spray, letting it wet his hair and flow down his back. Then he straightens, swipes his big, capable hands across his face, and shakes like a dog.

“Morning,” he offers cheerfully.

“No chitchat before coffee,” Bones says, glaring. Then he pushes Jim back until his ass hits the wall, drops to his knees, and kisses a part of Jim that _really_ doesn’t fucking mind morning breath.

Jim finds it inexplicably amusing to shampoo Bones’s hair while receiving another awesome display of only-slightly-rusty fellatio skills. And ball-fondling. And perineum-stroking. Those fucking _hands_...

This vacation, man. He digs it.

Jim unhooks the shower head a little shakily, and Bones has to shut his eyes so Jim can rinse his hair without getting suds in his eyes. The man is fucking beautiful all trusting like that, wet and handsome and with Little Jimmy in his mouth. A little voice in the back of his head starts telling Jim that this would be _awesome_ as a regular thing, but he dismisses it irritably. Not what they’re here for.

The character of the sucking changes, and Jim leans more heavily on the wall in readiness for any resultant trembling of knees. (Thighs, actually. Knees can’t really tremble, can they? But this is an asshole-ish line of thought which Jim swiftly banishes.) He’s panting now, the urge to fuck that hot, sweet mouth insistent. He wants to say something, even if it’s just _oh, God, Bones, how are you so damn amazing?_ But the pre-coffee rule seemed pretty unambiguous, on the whole. So he just enjoys, stroking a hand through Bones’s hair, enjoying the pressure and heat and the fundamental basic dirty awesomeness of getting really good head.

Then Bones looks up, and their gazes lock, and that’s it, Jim barely has time to whine in what he hopes is a warning tone before he’s spurting, and Bones swallows greedily, and then it’s over. Jim takes a moment to recover his breath and his balance, then offers a hand up.

***

They mosey on down to the hotel restaurant, where Bones slaps Jim’s hand away when he tries to point to one of the chocolaty croissants in the keep-fresh case. He grumbles in his own head about how Doctor Cranky Pants is actually supposed to be on vacation, not peering over Jim’s shoulder approving or vetoing every morsel he wants to stick in his mouth. He turns to offer sexual favours in exchange for sweet chocolate goodness, but Bones preemptively shushes him with a look of great and terrible fury. Well, a discouraging one, anyway. It’s frowny. So Jim settles for the regular kind, and they wind up sitting at a nice table next to a potted plant, with a little plate of croissants and a couple of big mugs of fragrant coffee.

Under the influence of sweet flaky pastry and rich dark coffee, Bones rapidly perks up enough to become capable of actual human conversation. Well, mostly.

“I’d have let you come on my face,” he says, sounding oddly strained.

Jim chokes on his food, and gets absolutely no hint of a sympathetic expression from the cause of his current coughing distress. He recovers valiantly, however, sips his coffee, and grins, barely able to believe that the first thing Bones said to him all morning could possibly have been _that_. That even now, when distractions are plenty, Bones is still thinking about having sex with him. Plus, hey, is Bones kinky? Intriguing. “Noted. So, you wanna do anything today that involves actually leaving our room?”

“Hmpf,” Bones says. Possibly that means he’ll think about it. 

Possibly it means that he thinks Jim means _sex_ outside their room. Which is not what Jim had in mind, but he wouldn’t want Bones to think he was preemptively declining any sexy outdoor shenanigans which might later be offered.

“We could ski,” he suggests, when they’re done with the pastries and have moved on to fruit.

Bones’s glare speaks volumes. So many volumes that Jim’s sure it manages to comment eloquently on both the skiing plan of awesome _and_ the mouthful of apple Jim probably should have finished chewing and swallowing prior to attempting verbal communication.

“A walk,” he allows, gesturing with the paring knife with which he has been delicately dissecting a poor innocent pear from the bowl. “Take in the sights. Get our bearings.” His foot nudges Jim’s under the table, possibly not unaccidentally (footsie, Bones? Cute). “Then we’ll see.”

Oh, yes. This vacation was a marvellous idea.

***

It’s on the fourth night of their stay that Bones disappears. He hasn’t left a note or anything, as far as Jim can see when he gets back from returning an unexpected call from his mom out on the balcony. And he’s not answering his communicator.

Jim frowns and heads downstairs, but can find no sign of Bones in the restaurant or lobby. So he asks the desk girl whether she’s seen the tall, handsome, grouchy dude with the Georgia accent around. She irritably flips the end of her ponytail off her shoulder, but he’s pretty sure she’s annoyed with the hair rather than with him. Which is how it should be, in Jim’s book.

“I saw him talking to Ted the bartender, about a quarter of an hour ago? Then he had someone call him a taxi.”

“Where’s Ted the bartender?”

“Gone now. He was just going off shift when your friend was talking to him.”

Jim purses his lips. “Huh. Okay. What was he wearing? My friend, I mean, not Ted.”

The woman closes her eyes a moment. Her eyelashes are naked, and Jim wonders vaguely whether it’s weird and creepy to notice things like that. “Dark jeans, and a shirt with some sparkly threads in it. Like a western-style one. With a couple of buttons undone. He looked good.”

Jim grins, despite his annoyance at Bones. “Yeah. He is kinda hot. Sounds like he made an effort.” He pauses to scratch his head. “What would you say are the best nightspots around here? Where does a hot guy go to pick up other hot guys?”

She smiles. “I’ll make you a list. And call you a taxi.”

***

Jim knows what Bones is doing even before he finds him. He’s standing in the one dark corner of an over-lit club, ogling handsome men as they dance. _Testing himself_. He scowls when he spots Jim making his way over with drinks, but it’s not the kind of scowl that flays off human skin at twenty paces, so it’s clear his heart isn’t in it. Besides, Jim can always tell when someone’s pleased to see him, however secretly.

“Local beer A or local beer B, your choice.”

Bones points at the lager. Jim hands him his selection. They open their bottles and drink. Jim’s not known for his discerning palate where alcoholic beverages are concerned, but his ale is nice and mellow enough for him.

“So,” he says, when the catchy pop tune’s finished and the DJ’s put on something ancient and slow-dancey instead, “are you tempted?”

“Does a bear shit in the woods?”

“I’ll hold your drink,” Jim says, voice carefully neutral, “if you wanna go and ask someone to dance or whatever.” 

Bones looks from the dance-floor to Jim and back again. And doesn’t move for the length of a song. Then he appears to shake himself. “I’d rather dance with you. Or… not.”

The corner of Jim’s mouth twitches hopefully. “Come on, I’ll blow you in the bathroom.”

“No, I… That isn’t what I…” He seems to run out of words, and makes do with seizing Jim’s wrist and dragging him out of the club into the chill night air.

They wind up doing it on the day bed again, Bones folded in half, showing a level of flexibility for which Jim is suitably grateful, you better believe it. His legs hook over Jim’s shoulders as he takes it, deep and slow and perfect. And throughout, he cries for more, and harder, and oh, God, _yes_ , and please, and yessssss, and don’t stop, and oh Jim oh _fuck_ oh fuck oh fuck…

It’s good.

***

It’s a shock of deja vu and heat and bright, bright summer sunshine when they step off the shuttle at Starfleet Academy once more in the mid-afternoon on the other side of the date line. Feels like they’ve been gone _weeks_. Like they’ve been impossibly far away doing incredibly exhausting things. Jim feels oddly hollow. Empty.

Beside him on the path outside the main hangar, Bones is making a grand show of kissing the ground. The sight is inexplicably cheering.

They shoulder their gear and walk, in no hurry.

Outside Jim’s dorm they part. It’s Bones who leans in for a kiss, which Jim thinks is a great sign. The wistful quality of it is most likely all in his imagination.

“Call me when you know your schedule?”

Bones nods, turns, and walks away.

Jim admires his retreating ass with a certain not-entirely-undeserved smugness. He totally tapped that. And Bones _loved_ it.

***

Jim’s not all that worried when Bones seems to be trying to avoid Jim, or at least any serious private conversation with Jim, over the following week. But, eventually, their schedules sync up and they have free time together and Bones can’t exactly refuse to let him in, right?

And he doesn’t. He points at the couch and goes to fetch beer.

And then acts like they’re just two buddies hanging out in their spare time.

Like nothing’s changed.

Like he’s drawn a line under their time downunder and is now determined to act like it never happened.

Which was always a possibility.

Jim just didn’t expect it would hurt this fucking much.

***

Okay, so it’s been a month—marked on his calendar on the academy network and everything—and Jim hasn’t said anything about... anything. And mostly that seems like good strategy, waiting, knowing he’ll be the first to know if Bones changes his mind, knowing he’d be an asshole to push. But sometimes it feels kinda like cowardice.

Perhaps that’s why one night he finds himself stalking Bones through the training pool where they’ve been swimming. Well, Bones swims, Jim plays. They both ignore the shuttle simulator abandoned for the evening at the far end of the pool.

Jim doesn’t look forward to the day either of them has to take the test they’re setting up for—Bones is _not_ going to be a pretty sight when the water starts dumping in around him and he has to make a textbook escape, and Jim doesn’t think he’ll cope much better when he’s merely imagining all that water pouring in around his best friend instead. But the great metal hulk is harmless enough for now, and the superstitious dread of the exam does as much to keep the pool empty as Jim’s minor recreational hackery. By their powers combined, he and Bones are alone for the foreseeable future. Wet, half naked, and very much alone.

Anyway, right now, Bones is a _very_ pretty sight as Jim pins him against the pool wall and holds him there. He stiffens appreciably, glancing around as though to assure himself for the fourteenth time that security hasn’t found them, but it’s only transitory before he relaxes into Jim’s embrace.

“So, you hook up with anyone since the inexpressible awesomeness that was me?”

“No, Jim, I did not. I dunno where I could have found the time. You?”

There’s an edge to his words that Jim neither understands nor misses.

“I’ve had even less time than you have, man.” It’s an effort to hold his position, not allow his hands to go wandering down over that well-toned torso. “And I haven’t met anyone I wanted half so much as I want you.”

He’s pretty sure he didn’t imagine that catch of breath. He’s _very_ sure he’s not imagining the subsequent tongue-kissing action, or its orchestral score of needy groanings. Or the legs that wrap around him as Bones trusts him to keep them both afloat while the little chlorinated waves lap at their shoulders.

When it ends they’re both panting, and Jim’s more than half expecting to hear that they really can’t start this up again.

“Not here,” Bones says. And then rocks his very noticeable hard-on against Jim. Then he lets go.

Jim smiles as he slides under the water and breast-strokes slowly away.

***

Summer school is a major mission, Jim finds. Almost enough to make a guy regret having wisely wheedled and masterfully manoeuvred his way into being allowed to take more credits than the officially permitted maximum. Lots of class hours. Like, almost thirty a week. And so much homework that even for a regular awesome geniuspants like Jim the hours required are going to be a wee bit fucking taxing. All the same, there is absolutely no way that he’s not making time for Bones the very next evening, oh yes. He can speed-read two chapters on engine hydraulics over breakfast if he has to. Probably.

So he shows up at Bonesy’s at the appropriate hour to meet Doctor Workaholic returning from his double shift at the clinic. Bones looks too tired to talk, but since his chosen communication method is to seize Jim by the lapels, haul him into the bathroom, and start stripping off clothes in a whirlwind of flying hands, Jim is not exactly overcome with the desire to protest at the lack of their usual repartee. Instead, he helps with the naked-making, and lets Bones shove him into the small shower cubicle and turn on the water. Jim finds himself flat against the wall with Bones grinding deliciously against him, skin on skin, dick on dick. He smiles, finds the soap, and makes with the slippery sudsy skin-making. Bones groans and bites his shoulder, dropping his skilled hands into the mix and jerking them both off. A hundred vivid memories of fucking in Queenstown flash through Jim’s head and he comes, hard. There’s a delicious aftershock of pleasure when Bones comes too.

Jim absently spreads their spilled semen across Bones’s stomach, tracing spirals over the wet skin until Bones slaps his hand away with an expression of fond exasperation.

Afterwards, they wash quickly, then allow the automatic system to dry them. Memories of other times with other people make Jim vaguely anxious that he’s gonna get kicked out now that the sex is done. But Bones merely pads off to collapse, naked, in his bed, and lifts one lazy arm to indicate his desire for a cuddle.

Jim tries not to bounce too heartily on the bed in his eagerness to accept this invitation.

***

Okay, Jim thinks, while hurrying through an indifferent lunch (some vegetarian rice dish, and an apple) in the mess a couple of weeks later. So they’re back on. But Bones still isn’t quite… _relaxed_ about it, like he should be. He still seems tense. And the sex? He’s either really aggressive about it or else he doesn’t even give off signals until Jim makes an approach. He’s acting nothing at all like Jim would expect Leonard McCoy to act in a relationship. Not like the raging nymphomaniac he seemed so sure he’d become, and not like the sweet, if grouchy, romantic Jim would have imagined. It’s more like they’re in some weird holding pattern, like Bones is waiting for the other shoe, or a whole _fleet_ of shoes, to drop right on his poor unprotected head.

It’s a puzzle. And it’s not exactly joy-bringing. And Jim doesn’t have much idea what to do about it, short of sitting Bones down yet _again_ and trying to make the bastard talk about his _feelings_. Which, as he recalls, was not such a wonderful, therapeutic experience on previous occasions.

But maybe he’s just looking for trouble here. Maybe he should just let Bones sort of settle into this thing? After all, he’s never had a long-term relationship with a man—as far as Jim knows, he’s never had a long-term relationship with _anyone_ apart from his ex-wife, and look at how _that_ ended. Maybe for once he shouldn’t try to solve a problem, should just be Awesome Friend Guy and Understanding Boyfriend Guy and just give Bones a chance to get comfortable with this stuff? Not a very action hero plan, but not exactly a risky one, either. Good enough until his next bright idea finds him, anyway.

Jim crunches happily through his apple, suddenly recalling, with amusement, being accused of chewing so loudly last Monday that Bones could hear him from the goddamn clinic.

***

“Need to talk to you,” Bones says, later that night while they’re homeworking like good little space cadets.

Jim looks up at that tone. It wasn’t _quite_ the dreaded We Need To Talk, Jim tone, but all the same it was loaded with, like, gravitas and shit. He puts down his padd. Stretches his legs comfortably out on the carpet, points his toes at his Bones. “Okay. Shoot.”

Bones looks suddenly pained. “Don’t worry about it. I—it’s not important.”

“Not important,” Jim repeats slowly. Bones looks… hopeful. Almost pleading. Jim sighs. Forces a smile and a shrug. “Okay, man. But we can talk any time—you know that, right?”

Bones nods, once, with finality. Then he returns to the draft he’s been pecking away at for some days now which he alleges is a term paper for Professor Zammit, but which Jim suspects is actually some kind of textbook he’s secretly writing. Jim occasionally checks the nets to see whether any likely forthcoming tome has been announced— _How to Save Lives with Good Old-Fashioned Doctoring and Some Goddamn Common Sense_ , by L. H. McCoy, or something to that effect—but he hasn’t spotted anything yet.

Jim smiles and returns to his own assignment. Bones will talk when he’s ready. Neither of them is going anywhere.

***

Jim is happily, and snoringly, appreciating that his boyfriend has an actual human-sized bed, not one of the short, narrow monstrosities most cadets have to make do with, as well as the space to put it, when Bones decides he is ready to open his grumbly mouth and Speak Important Truths. There is also some grabbing of Jim’s arm and some half-hearted shaking, which has the unfortunate—and no doubt intended—effect of nudging him well into the wakeful stretch of the sleeping-drowsing-wakeful road.

“Wha?” he manages, opening one eye to peer at his Bones, who is sitting primly beside him with his surgeonly fingers folded in his lap. He’s still dressed, though it would seem he’s finally finished whatever masterpiece of academic writing had kept him from rogering Jim senseless earlier in the evening. Hopefully there is not about to be any unpleasant kicking out of handsome sleepy cadets in the next five minutes, because really that would be _so_ uncool.

“You listening, lazy _bones_? I wanna talk to you about something. About sex.”

Jim perks up immediately, pulls himself up into a sitting position so there’s no chance he’ll fall asleep again. Tries to look more compassionately understanding and confidence-worthy than, you know, curious and pervy and eager for The Goss. “What’s up, Doc?”

He gets a glare for that, but the man’s heart clearly isn’t in it. Trust Leonard McCoy to be able to glare _fondly_. “Well, Jim, I keep on having these dreams. Thought I should probably tell you about ‘em.”

 

He’s stalling, but Jim’s too ladylike to say so. Just nods politely and tries to look trustworthy without looking like he’s trying to look trustworthy, because people who try to look trustworthy tend to end up looking like used hovercar salesmen.

Bones stares at his hands. “In the dreams, I want it, but I’m fighting you all the same. And you take me.” His tongue flicks out to moisten his lips, and then he lifts his head to give Jim a look which is somehow simultaneously the hottest thing ever and downright heart-breaking. 

“Okay,” Jim says, attempting neutral and non-threatening while his mind races to understand this new information. 

Bones sucks in an audible breath. “I want to try it, play it out. Want you to take me. I want… I’ll say something, I don’t know, ‘bananas’. If I actually want you to stop. Does that—do you—?” He groans, very softly, like he’s annoyed with himself.

Jim’s been told a fair few sexual fantasies in his time. Usually, his reaction’s pretty immediate, the idea turns him on or else it repulses him. This... doesn’t really do either. Or perhaps it does both, he’s not sure. But what he knows is that this is Bones, and he wants to help Bones be all happy and fulfilled. So if this is what Bones wants, and it’s not going to hurt either of them, why wouldn’t he give it a go? And, hey, he’ll finally be able to use those drama credits for something besides looking unimpeachably Innocent and talking his way out of trouble.

He shuffles closer, offers a big old manly hug which Bones accepts. As their cheeks touch, they both sigh. It would be difficult to miss that Bones is trembling. “Another day,” Jim murmurs, sounding as light and carefree as he can manage, “when we’ve got plenty of time, we should totally try that. Might be hot. Bananas, huh?”

Bones makes a soft, disdainful, snorty sound. “Well, I’m not likely to scream it out accidentally in the throes of passion, am I?”

“Not unless there’s something you’re not telling me. Perhaps some super-secret teenage masturbation methods?”

He gets a poke in the ribs for that, along with some kind of half-swallowed grumble about goddamn irresponsible sex-toy substitutes. Jim laughs, leans back a bit, takes Bones’s stubbled jaw in one hand and looks him straight in the eye. Kisses him, still stifling snickers. This… _thing_ he has with Bones might not be perfect—hell, it’s a long way from perfect, Jim knows that without ever having _seen_ perfect—but it just might be the  
best thing James T. Kirk has ever had. And he plans to keep it, oh, stars, yes.

***

The instant Jim walks in on Saturday night and sees the look on Bones’s face he knows it’s on. His gaze doesn’t shift even as he bends to deposit his backpack safely on the floor by the couch. Bones continues to stand there by the window, barefoot and wearing those ancient, slouchy blue jeans Jim likes. His arms hang loosely by his sides, and he watches, looking cautious but determined, as Jim leans back against the desk to toe off his shoes and socks.

“Bananas?” he whispers, into the silence between them, a check that they’re on the same page. He’s a little nervous, but he’s also totally psyched for this. And he’s subjected the scenario and all obvious variables to intensive tactical analysis. Which is to say, he’s totally got _ideas_ for this, man.

Bones’s nod is so vehement it cannot be good for his neck. 

Jim straightens up and approaches his quarry, keeping his gait slow and deliberate, a predator’s stalk. Pulls Bones closer to the centre of the room so he can circle him, looking him up and down as he goes. 

He plasters himself against Bones’s back. “Aren’t you a pretty thing?” he breathes, into Bones’s ear, and gets a noticeable case of the shivers for answer. “Don’t be scared. You’re gonna love it.” 

He’s just beginning to turn him in his arms when Bones makes a move to duck past him, towards the bedroom. Jim stops him easily, half violence, half embrace, slams him back against the nearest wall. Bones grunts in surprise, then glares. 

Jim draws in a deep, steadying breath, then grabs Bones by the jaw and kisses him hard. Bones is unresponsive for long moments, not fighting but not giving in either. Jim nips his bottom lip impatiently, taking advantage of the resulting tiny gasp to push his tongue in and taste the familiar Bonesy taste he loves, with an added hint of coffee. He eases up only when Bones leans into him and and opens his mouth in surrender. Jim explores, running his tongue over teeth and sucking that lovely lower lip, pinning Bones in place with his body weight to free up a hand for kneading that excellent ass. 

And then he remembers where they are, why this position has such nostalgia value. He claims Bones’s mouth all the more fiercely.

Bones breaks the kiss, gasping, turns his head away. Mutters “I shouldn’t…”

Jim suddenly recalls, in vivid clarity, their first kiss and its aftermath. The way Bones had blown so fucking hot and then so icy cold. And he starts to get that this isn’t just a fantasy they’re playing out, it’s a way for Bones to work through his demons, resolve something in his own head. Something important. Which only makes Jim more determined to see out this scenario, to make it fantastic. 

“This is gonna be so good,” he purrs, leaving off the affectionate _Bones_ only with an effort. The hands on Jim’s shoulders grow heavier and heavier, as if their owner can’t decide whether they should be pushing or pulling. “That tight little ass was _made_ for my cock.” He trails his fingertips down Bones’s cheek, feels his jaw tighten. “You’re going to be begging for more, harder, deeper, and if you’re good you’ll get it. Are you gonna be good?”

Bones promptly starts to nod, then catches himself and slowly shakes his head. Jim smirks and grinds up against him. His stiffy totally finds its opposite number.

“Stay,” Jim warns, before stepping back to pull off his t-shirt. He’s unusually aware of Bones’s attention riveted on him, the force of it, the heat. “You like what you see?”

Bones’s gaze drops to the floor. Jim thinks he might be blushing. He likes that. He can work with that.

Jim trails his hand up the line of buttons on Bones's casual shirt, prodding at the tiny fastenings but not forcing them open quite yet. He scratches a nail over one fabric-covered nipple and chuckles when Bones jumps in surprise and then totally tries to act like he didn’t. "Oh yes," he says, not even trying to disguise the satisfaction in his voice. "You like this, don't ya, baby?"

Bones keeps his eyes averted and shakes his head.

"Liar," Jim whispers, leaning close enough to breathe it in his ear.

He works his hand between them, finding the button just over Bones's solar plexus and fiddling with it. Bones is trembling now, nostrils flaring as he turns his head, dodging Jim's questing lips. Jim presses against him harder, tugging on the shirt hard enough to pop the button loose. It slides to the floor, bouncing once on the carpet tiles. Bones's head snaps up, his eyes wide and his mouth falling open in shock. Jim's greedy hand flies in to find the new gap in the shirt and he groans when he finally gets to feel Bones's naked skin shuddering beneath his palm.

Bones starts fighting him now, bucking his hips and trying to twist away from Jim's grip. His arms come up to block him, then to skirmish ludicrously with Jim’s hands as he attacks the next button. Jim snarls a warning and bites down on his neck, distracting Bones long enough to get both of his hands into the picture and rip the shirt apart.

He leans back enough to take in the sight of Bones panting harshly, the wreckage of his shirt slipping down his shoulders with every hitch of his now gloriously exposed chest. “So pretty,” he breathes, and reaches a finger to trace his initials over all that lovely skin. “And all _mine_.”

“I don't want to do this,” Bones says, suddenly rather flushed and breathing fast. “You can’t make me do this.”

“Like hell you don’t.” He repeats the little cheek pat that once worked so well on a certain baked-goods-reminiscent cadet. Bones tries to turn his head away, which inexplicably brings out the growl in Jim. “And like _hell_ I can’t.”

It’s not easy to wrestle a man of Leonard McCoy’s size across a room, through a doorway, and onto a bed, especially when he’s digging his damn heels in, but Jim is both determined and combat-trained. 

He also cheats. 

He kicks a leg out from under his uncooperative darling as soon as they’re in falling range of the bed. Bones crashes down like a felled tree, head missing the pillows but still managing a safe landing on the big bed. He looks up at Jim, one eyebrow raised, body tensed as if for flight. So Jim flings himself onto his hands and knees over Bones.

The pink of Bones’s lips, the lower one slightly nibbled, catches Jim’s attention, so he stares at that mouth until Bones notices. “I should choke you with my cock right now,” he casually observes. “Give that pretty mouth something to do.” Bones’s eyes go wide, so Jim embellishes. “My dick would really, really like to fuck your mouth.”

“I’ll bite,” Bones snarls. “I’ll bite it _off_.” And he surges up, knocking at Jim’s arms and almost managing to topple him over sideways.

Jim stretches out, lets him have his full body weight. Forces Bones’s arms to his sides and holds them there. He waits for the inevitable attempt to wrench them free, squeezes hard enough to mark as he holds them implacably in place. He stares into Bones’s dilated pupils, listens to the gasp as he grinds down against the heat of Bones’s erection.

“Knock it off, honey, or get ready for worse.”

Bones doesn’t knock it off.

Jim sits up, straddles his Bones despite the mechanical bull impression he’s currently doing. Leans way forward and lays his hand over Bones’s throat in warning.

Bones goes utterly still, then blinks rapidly several times, and Jim can feel him swallow beneath his palm. The lust-addled look lifts briefly. “You could kill me, without even meaning to, if you tightened that hand.” His voice is bland, serious.

Jim nods. “I know.” 

They look at each other a moment, ascertaining that they’re both on the same page. That it’s totally not an issue because Jim never would. 

Then he brings back the Total Bastard Smirk. “You’re going to want to be _very_ still right now, baby.”

And he starts taking the tour, first just admiring that wonderful chest, and stomach, and shoulders, and arms, those deft surgeon’s hands clenched tight at his sides, then dragging the fingers of his free hand over them in a long, meandering feather-light caress. Bones is good and quiet and still, right up until Jim discovers a ticklish spot just below his navel. And then he strokes it more firmly, and finds that ‘ticklish’ is perhaps not the best description. Bones grunts, and twitches. So Jim keeps it up, and earns some definite thrusting action and an honest-to-God _moan_.

Bringing his other hand down to explore this magic new erogenous zone turns out to be a bad idea, because Bones starts fighting again, starts grabbing for Jim and trying to throw him off, so that Jim’s obliged to lie on him again and dig his pointy Kirk elbows into the Bonesy biceps. But lying on Bones: really not such a hardship, is it?

In the course of Bones’s attempts to grab him or push him aside or whatever, their naked chests rub together, their still-clothed erections grind together, and it is most definitely not all Jim’s doing. He squidges down a bit so he can lower his head, kiss a nipple, bite over a pec, enjoys the whine this earns him and the subsequent attempts to thump him and buck him off. He’d been worried at first that, no matter how much Bones said he wanted this, in the actual execution this would be, well, kinda creepy. But in practice, he finds he can sense Bones’s longing and lust, it radiates off him along with the heat of his spectacular body. Whatever this might look like, it _feels_ like two guys who want desperately to fuck using wrestling as foreplay.

And, hey, he can use this. He forces a hand between them, works to open both their flies so all this wriggling around can help work their pants down. His action draws a definite groan of relief from Bones, though he promptly resumes glaring and thrashing when Jim takes the opportunity to grope his package a little.

“You’re so hard for me, baby. Tell me how much you want it.”

“Fuck you,” Bones says, fingers digging into Jim's arms hard enough to hurt.

He gives Bones’s left nipple a vicious twist which makes him yelp. “Wrong answer.” He rolls his hips, feels his pants slip down an inch or so. Squirms some more to encourage the effect. Cuts off Bones’s complaints about sadism with a sound kiss while he works with hips and hands on the all-important clothing-nudity situation.

They both groan when their pants and underwear are finally pushed low enough for their bare cocks to meet, and Bones’s short nails score viciously down Jim's back as his hips roll up for more delicious friction. Both their dicks are _definitely_ on board for this little party, Jim notes with satisfaction, humming in pleasure as they frot. 

It’s too good, and it’s not what they’re here for, so Jim slides roughly off Bones and forces him onto his side. Yanks one of his arms back into a restraining hold to discourage any unwise movement. Jim’s pants are down by his knees, and he kicks them off irritably, watching Bones struggle to do likewise without putting the wrong kind of pressure on his arm.

And then they’re naked, and that’s, well, pretty much the most difficult part out of the way, right? Jim hopes so.

Bones grunts when Jim grabs his leg, bends it up as he pushes Bones over so he’s almost on his stomach, knee up by his chest. He places a heavy hand in the middle of that broad, beautiful back to encourage the staying of put, and Bones doesn’t immediately shift when the hand does.

“Good boy. I’d hate to have to bruise that beautiful ass.”

Bones visibly stiffens, but only mutters incomprehensibly into the hairy forearm his face is pillowed on while Jim leans way over him to snag the supplies from the nightstand. 

He’d quite like to engage in a little brain-melting rimming right about now, but, short of lying on Bones’s back to do it, he can’t really see how he’d manage it against Bones’s sporadic, but determined flailings. So he settles for tickling the little hole with a finger instead, watching Bones wriggle in a way that seems oddly encouraging considering the disgruntled, complain-y noises coming out of that lovely, profane mouth. Jim lubes up his fingers, then tickles some more until one of Bones’s writhings pushes back on Jim’s hand just so and a fingertip slips in. Bones gasps and goes still, rigid.

“See? You _can_ behave nicely when you make an effort. Now be good, or I’ll tear you apart with my dick.”

Bones whimpers and subtly rocks back.

After that, Jim stretches him open quickly, methodically, then stops to don a condom. “Do you feel empty now?” He waits, counting slowly to ten, for Bones to say the magic word, or any other word, really, that means he wants out. But there’s only silence and a tilt of hips like Bones’s ass is begging for more. Jim sighs out a breath. It is _on_.

When he lies down behind Bones, he can feel him trembling. So he kisses the back of his neck, his shoulder, and murmurs soothing nothings a while until he starts to pick up impatient vibes. There’s something distinctly impatient about the speeding elbow that comes his way, also. So Jim snickers and smacks Bones’s ass to warm it up a little. Then he leans in to whisper huskily in Bones’s ear. “I’m going to pack you so full you’ll taste it when I come.” His promise gets him a faint moan of longing and a full body twitch. Oh, yes. This does not suck.

The noises Bones makes when Jim starts to work his dick inside are absolutely, positively not disapproval. Needy, yes, and perhaps a little pained, with a hint of disbelief, but definitely all encouraging. He squirms, too, but he isn’t trying to squirm _away_. And _fuck_ , he feels good, hot and tight and so, so perfect. And this is new, the not-face-to-face thing, makes him feel all protective and trusted, and that’s exciting all on its own. Jim growls and begins to move, smooth and slow at first, then more insistent, making Bones’s breath catch on every inward move.

Bones rather abruptly resumes fighting, so that Jim has to pull out to kneel and haul him up onto his knees. Jim repositions while Bones gets his elbows under him, takes a second to admire the long bare back, the fingers clutching handfuls of sheet. Bones is still visibly shaking. Perhaps they both are. 

Jim drives back in and they both grunt in relief. Now, when Bones starts to flail, Jim can grab him by the hips and ride the flailings. And it’s just that easy, Bones basically fucks himself on his dick with all that wriggling and arching and bucking, at first whimpering and then crying out at the pleasure of it. Jim just has to hang on and try not to come.

“Fuck,” says Bones. “Goddamn... fucking...”

Man, he loves it when the Bonester swears.

“You take it so good, baby,” he coos. “Such an obliging little hole.” He pulls him up so he can kiss Bones’s neck, lick at the sweat-salty skin. Starts sucking in a mark, like some brand of ownership.

The longer Jim fucks him, the louder Bones gets, progressing from whimpers to moans to choked little sobs and the occasional yelp of startled pleasure. It’s fantastic motivation to make this last, so Jim does his best. He frees up a hand, places it gently over Bones’s mouth as though to silence him. Feels his palm promptly licked, then nibbled at almost desperately. So Jim gives him two fingers to suck on instead, feels their mingled moan as those digits are subjected to just the kind of oral attention Jim’s dick digs best.

It’s not until the first tear hits his hand that he realises Bones is crying. He stops completely, ignores the cold flicker of doubt in favour of trusting Bones. If there’s a problem, Bones will tell him. “Are you okay?” he whispers, withdrawing his muffling hand.

Bones’s reaction is immediate, the world’s most vehement nod. “Yeah,” he says. He sounds ragged and broken. “Perfect.”

He’s crying... because it’s good. Oh man, that’s just... 

Jim loses it, reaching frantically for his partner’s dick and jerking Bones off while he comes apart in a series of artless, frenzied thrusts, muffling his cries in Bones’s shoulder. That Bones is right there with him, shouting as he spurts into Jim’s hand, only magnifies the awesome that is this, here, now.

When Jim comes up again, he’s still dazed and panting and Bones has a firm grip on his wrist and is licking his fingers clean. Something primal zings unexpectedly through Jim, and his dick gives a feeble twitch in Bones’s ass. He presses a kiss to the bump of a vertebra, then disengages reluctantly. Turns back from disposing of the condom to catch Bones wiping his eyes. He looks like he’s just stumbled in from a storm, windswept, adrenaline-addled, just starting to relax into the sudden warmth of secure shelter. Jim claps him on the arm, unsure what to say. Bones grabs his face with both hands and kisses him, closed-mouthed but hardly chaste. Just before pulling away, his mouth opens and he nibbles at Jim’s lower lip. Then he’s staring at Jim, a slow smile forming on his face. Jim returns the smile.

After that, they get ready for bed and don’t talk.

Bones clings to him all night.

***

They don’t talk about it in the morning, either, but around lunchtime Jim’s padd registers a message as he’s idly taking notes in Theories of Leadership class.

_Send me a list of your favourite baked goods. Winter’s coming and someone’s gotta fatten you up, boy. L. H. M._

Jim thinks that might be the most sneaky-romantic thing anyone’s ever said to him. Especially since it’s not even technically fall yet, so winter is not exactly just around the fucking corner.

***

Bones is moody and snappish for the next few days, though Jim’s confident it’s nothing he’s done. So he smiles through the grumbling about idiot cadets and their idiotic injuries, nods politely at suitable intervals during the occasional full-on rant about the pointless bureaucracy, and, of course, the slew of idiot higher-ups, which make Bones’s doctoring more difficult than it ought to be. It’s not the most pleasant thing they could be doing together, but it feels important to show that helping Bones stay sane by listening to him vent is something Jim’s totally up for. And, besides, there’s an upside: a good long Bonesy rant is a golden opportunity to let that slow, sweet accent weave over him like decadent caramel fudge over ice cream.

Although there is a fantastic surfeit of blowjobs in the shower and handjobs before bed and oh so delicious rubbing off on one another any time they have the chance, they don’t actually _fuck_ fuck again for more than a week.

When it happens, on a Sunday night after they’ve had exactly one standard drink each and abruptly realise that neither of them is actually focused on the padds they’re supposed to be reading, they rise silently. As if by mutual agreement, Jim fishes out the lube and stuff while Bones slips into the bathroom and shuts the door. He’s silent on his feet, like a cat, and Jim’s momentarily diverted into wondering just how thoroughly Bones trounced all the neighbourhood children at hide and seek and other such games as a kid. It’s oddly difficult to imagine Leonard McCoy that young, that—innocent, maybe. Undamaged. Uncynical. Jim shrugs and starts to strip.

When Bones emerges from the bathroom he is naked, hard, and utterly unselfconscious. They rendezvous by the bed for a kiss that is languid and unhurried and makes Jim sigh as he opens his mouth further, unable to express in words, even in his own head, just how completely available he is to this man. How deeply he trusts, wants, cares. He wants Bones to know him, really know him, like no one has in years.

There’s no fighting and no safe-words. They don’t speak at all, really. Bones ends up on his back once more, feet hooked behind Jim’s ass. Jim would have gone for the legs-over-shoulders option, but the vibe he’s getting here is about wanting to be close enough to kiss comfortably. Actually, Bones just seems to need to be as close as possible; he clings and pulls and wriggles as if he wants to get closer still, as if nothing short of somehow climbing right inside Jim’s skin will do. But it’s good, really good, and Bones produces more of those tiny helpless sounds that make Jim tingle and shiver and strive to fuck him harder, better, more. Bones doesn’t take his eyes off him, not when they kiss, not even when he comes, unexpectedly, before Jim can even start to think about shifting so he can give him a hand.

“Wow,” Jim breathes, astounded half at Bones for coming so quick and half at himself for having the strength to still and give Bones a break. The sight of that blissed-out face makes the effort worthwhile.

A minute passes, maybe two. Captain Fantastic isn’t overly happy about the delay, but since he _is_ someplace nice and warm and pleasantly tight Jim’s inclined to ignore his complaints.

Then Bones’s various limbs tighten around him once more, and that meaning seems pretty clear. So is the rather shy little smile playing around Bones’s lips. It doesn’t go anywhere when Jim’s hips give an experimental roll.

Captain Fantastic doesn’t need much to get back within sight of Orgasm Harbour, a few thrusts, some savouring of that trusting, accepting look on a face that usually seems built for frowning. And then Bones says his name, just one breathy “Jim”, and that’s it, done for. He collapses in a sweaty, sated heap, only to have Bones swat him away with an uncomplimentary mutter about his weight that Jim chooses to assume is a subjective squashed lover’s opinion rather than an official medical one. He pulls out carefully, and they go through a perfunctory cleanup before collapsing back into bed for the night.

It’s lovely, and Jim could really get used to it. He’s sure that would have scared him, once.

***

Bones is already gone when Jim wakes, but there's a message waiting for him on his padd.

_Jim. I think I would be happier if there were rules._

He lets his subconscious mind worry that around a bit while he's “learning the basics of warp core management in a practical setting”--which is to say that he and his increasingly grease-smeared classmates have been put to work repairing the academy's ramshackle fleet of training shuttles. Clearly, Bones felt his meaning was obvious and unambiguous. So he’s gotta be talking about them, _this_ , whatever it is they have. And usually Jim’d guess that a lover talking about the application of “rules” would be looking to curtail certain of Jim’s more, uh, sociable tendencies, but with Bones…

Once Bones’d set the rules regarding their trip to New Zealand, he’d been fine, hadn’t he? He’d been calm, and as content as he ever got, in the weeks leading up to their departure. And once they’d got there, his second thoughts had apparently been at an end. Things had only got awkward again once they returned to SF and things were undecided, unstated, between them once more.

Would Bones feel more secure in their relationship if he had rules to govern his behaviour in it? Would being bound by rules make him feel more committed? Safer?

What kind of rules?

“That’s well done, Kirk,” says the tutor, chewing thoughtfully on his padd stylus as he consults his tricorder. “I believe we could safely bring the impulse reactor online now.” 

But they won’t, Jim knows. Flying would be too much _fun_.

“So what now, sir?”

“You ever do any panel-beating?”

Jim sighs and has to confess that, yeah, he’s done a bit of that in his time. It’s a long way from his favourite thing. But, hey, at least it’ll count for course credit, right?

***

“You look like a grease-trap shat on you.”

“Anyone ever tell you that your ladylike charm is one of your absolute bestest qualities, Bones?” His enjoyment of the resultant eye-roll is somewhat hampered by the sudden painful twinge of his injured back as he moves carelessly.

Which, of course, gets Bones’s full attention, even though Jim couldn’t actually say for sure that he’d made any sound or weird scary face that ought to have clued anyone in to his current discomfort. Perhaps Bones is just psychic where pain is concerned? At any rate, out comes the medical tricorder and the grumblings about irresponsible kids lugging engine parts all over the damn place and didn’t he know they had goddamn machinery to do that kind of task? Jim smiles a little as he’s fussed over, poked and prodded and eventually hypo’d quite thoroughly in the neck.

But then comes a nice part--something of a novelty where medical treatment is concerned--where Bones helps him out of his uniform jacket and shirt and makes him lie down for a massage.

A seriously fucking good massage, though ouchy in places. With weird heaty-cooly gel of some kind. Bones has great hands, and Jim’s hard-pressed to keep from purring aloud or humping the mattress. The lecture on How Breakable-and-Otherwise-Fuckupable the Human Spine is, Kid, and Why You Should Take Care of it Properly Or Else, is a pleasant wash of background music to Jim, who is beginning to feel more than a little spacey. In the good way. He hums something vaguely affirmative whenever Bones pauses the lecture for a response. The hands keep moving, and everything feels oh so good, and that’s all that really matters, right? All that… really…

It’s not until he blinks himself awake, an unknown time later, to find that he’s been using Bones’s chest for a pillow, and drooled on his t-shirt, that Jim remembers they had Something Important (probably) to discuss. He looks up at Bones, who appears to be manipulating something complex on his padd.

“Well, howdy. Back feel any better?”

Jim frowns as he remembers about his back. It doesn’t punish him for forgetting, fortunately. “Yup. Just goes to show I can’t get by without my Bones.”

All the same, he’s mighty careful sitting up.

“You should shower.” It’s actually rather a tactful reminder, considering the source.

Jim grins. “Care to join me?”

“Not tonight. I’m gonna finish this and then make us some supper.”

The awesome Kirk stomach voices its approval, loudly.

***

“So,” Jim says, around a mouthful of fantastic meaty-salady-saucy homemade sub sandwich a la Bones. “Rules.”

Bones chokes a bit, coughs, looks a bit annoyed, so Jim hurries on.

“Here’s what I was thinking. Rule one: honesty. Secrets might be okay sometimes, lying isn’t. Rule two:—” He takes a deep breath, because this is the big one, this is the one that, hey, might cause him to feel a bit deprived from time to time. But it’s what he’s pretty sure Bones needs to hear, and he needs to give Bones what he needs, you know? Because Bones is awesome and sexy and so, so worthy of a bit of goddamn happiness in life. “—We’re exclusive as, like, a default state. You don’t get physical with anyone else without my knowledge and approval. And I don’t without yours, yadda. I don’t actually have a rule three. What do you think?”

Bones hums in acknowledgement of the question, then finishes chewing his mouthful—very slowly, in Jim’s opinion. Then he pauses for a sip of his weird pulpy fruit juice. Then he clears his throat. “Sounds good to me,” he finally says, and lowers his gaze. Is he— _blushing?_ “Rule three: privacy. Let folks draw their own conclusions about us; I’m not ready to go helping ‘em out.”

Funny how that stipulation can make Jim feel simultaneously relieved and disappointed. “All right. Anything else you wanna add? Oh, fuck, this is so fucking _adult,_ man.”

Bones gives a quick rumble of amusement. “Don’t worry, son, you’ll get used to it.”

Jim shows him a finger.

“And there’s nothing I want to add just now.”

They look at each other then, and the moment thrums with something special, something intense and important and entirely new to Jim.

They finish their food and have to acknowledge the late hour and the necessity of sleep.

***

Bones's fears of rapid onset nymphomania are, of course, total bullshit.

Though Jim _does_ start getting what can only be termed booty calls. Quite a lot of them, really, if Jim's any judge. Which he totally is, thank you very much. 

There’s a text message demanding he report to a particular examination room in the campus infirmary at noon and bring sandwiches, damn it. Jim shows up obediently, paper sack of goodies in hand, and is shoved in the general direction of the exam couch while Bones pokes furiously at the door panel until he’s satisfied with its level of privacy locking. Then Bones sucks him off, while pulling at his own dick so roughly you’d almost think he was angry with it. Not a bad use of the lunch hour, all in all. And the sandwiches weren’t entirely terrible, either, even though they _had_ come from the cadets’ mess.

There’s a request that he show up by 1800 for a nice quiet study session, only the “study” turns out to be a hands-on examination of Leonard McCoy’s ass. Followed by fucking. And really not a whole lot of text-booking or essay-crafting at all.

There’s an invitation to come out to a club one night, which is unlike Bones because a) it’s a week night, b) it’s a loud place, and c) Bones is a homebody, and when he does venture out it’s usually to his familiar, quiet (boring) haunts. So he is presumably making an effort for Jim. Perhaps they’ll dance, Jim thinks foolishly as he dolls himself up for the occasion. They don’t end up dancing, but they do end up getting up to mischief in a bathroom stall like a pair of walking damn cliches. It’s awesome nonetheless, oh yes.

Then there’s a suggestion that they put in an appearance at a little shindig the medical track cadets are having to celebrate one of their own passing some important professional milestone or other. Jim scrubs off the layer of filth acquired from that day’s practical “lesson” on the cleaning of fuel tanks in class F shuttlecraft. And, he reflects, using students as free labour certainly _is_ practical. He pours himself into some exceptionally butt-complimenting jeans, and legs it across campus to arrive at the door marked “McCoy, L.H.” right at the appointed hour to pick him up.

“You’re late,” Bones grumbles, though Jim’s quite sure he isn’t. But then there’s a definite once-over glance, and then there’s hands on Jim’s lapels yanking him inside the apartment, and somehow they never actually get to the party. Oops. Colour Jim _devastated_ , man.

So, pretty much, Jim’s dick gets a good workout (also Jim’s mouth, and hands, and thighs, et cetera), sometimes two, three times a day, but it’s nothing the Jim Kirk Libido cannot handle with aplomb. Even if Bones _was_ wanting it often enough to test his limits, Jim’s pretty sure the JKL would totally rise to the occasion—after all, what’s hotter than being desperately wanted?

***

At some point in the following weeks, Jim comes to realise some things that probably ought to be pretty damn obvious. He’s in a stable, monogamous relationship, just like mom always hoped for him. And he’s pretty much kinda sorta de facto moved in with Bones. And he’s, well, _happy_. At fucking _Starfleet_ , and all.

It’s quite a shock, but not a bad one.

***

Bones looks up from the room’s comm unit as Jim enters, his face wan and his hair scruffy as if he’s been running his hands through it rather a lot. Asking if he’s okay seems a bit pointless, so Jim makes do with going over there, bracing a hand on the back of his chair and leaning down for a quick, undemanding kiss. Bones doesn’t turn it into more than that, doesn’t get out his tongue or drag Jim down onto his lap, but doesn’t do anything to discourage him either. But something feels off all the same.

“All right if I spread papers all over the floor? Got a huge physics problem I just can’t see straight on a screen, you know?”

Bones grunts. Jim has the bizarre urge to run from the room and not come back for several days. Instead, he goes to sit cross-legged in the big empty space between the bedroom door and the far wall, starts surrounding himself with papers and old-fashioned writing implements of various descriptions. And the printout of the physics problem, which is a challenge test: if he can solve this, he gets permission to skip lectures and assignments and just show up for the final exam in Commander Vetori’s class. And he can really truly put that time to _much_ better use.

Time floats by, Jim lost in a wealth of mental equations and surrounded by pages scrawled with multicoloured numbers and diagrams, and Bones not having moved from his place by the comm unit he doesn’t appear to be actually using. He lets Jim get totally engrossed in what he’s doing before he speaks.

“My wife called. She’s in town next week.”

It takes Jim a couple of seconds to realise something’s been said. He wrenches himself out of the happy physic-y headspace to replay the words in his head. Hopes his tiny gasp isn’t audible. From here, he can just see one side of his lover’s face, a tightly closed eye, a stubble-smattered cheek. Instinct tells him Bones is spoiling for a fight, and that “slip” was entirely deliberate. And while Jim doesn’t object to a bit of healthy fighting if it’ll do someone some good, he’d prefer a different, less destructive bone—er, _topic_ —of contention. He ponders how to respond neutrally.

“Cool. How’s she doing? You gonna meet up?”

Tap-tap-tap of fingers on desktop. “She seems chipper,” he says at last, almost a growl. “Felt polite to offer to take her to dinner someplace. Catch up.”

“Were you guys, you know, friends? Before the dating part?”

Bones abruptly slumps in the chair, right down until his head’s settled on the backrest. He looks like a turtle who hasn’t quite managed to sink back into his comfy old shell. “Since middle school, I guess. Though I do remember some pigtail pulling before that.”

Jim snickers, imagining Bones with pigtails. It’s kinda frightening how boner-killing that isn’t. The glare Bones turns on him, half-squashed though it is by the side of the chair, doesn’t help matters much either. 

“So, you wanna tag along and stay my hand should I give in to the temptation to strangle the bitch?”

Jim blinks at the resigned, wry question, because it sounds simultaneously completely at odds with everything that makes Bones Bones—and like the most honest emotion the man’s shown since Jim arrived.

“Sure,” he says, “I can do that.”

Bones pulls a face that doesn’t translate. But, eventually, he sighs and gets to his feet. “You have half an hour, kid, while I shower and do my beauty routine. Then I want sex or I want quiet and darkness, and either way I want Fermat’s Last Fucking Theorem gone from my carpet.”

Jim smiles his sweetest smile, even as he resolves not to have finished packing up by the specified time just so Bones has a legitimate opportunity to scold him. It seems to do the man good, after all.

***

Jocelyn is petite, moderately pretty, makeup-free, and has one of those strangely youthful faces that mean she could pass for early twenties even though Jim knows she’s actually slightly older than her former hubby. She gives him a peculiarly piercing once-over before shaking his hand, then she and Bones embrace awkwardly and exchange pecks on the cheek.

“You look well,” she says, rolling her eyes but allowing Bones to push in her chair for her. “You’ve put on some muscle, I think.”

She gets a grunt for a response to that, and her eyes twinkle as she turns to Jim. “So you’re the best friend I’ve been hearing about.” There’s the faintest emphasis on _friend_ , and if he hadn’t already suspected she knew about them, that would definitely have done it. “The bar-brawl-prone goddamn genius kid?”

Her Bones impression is so spot-on that Jim can’t help laughing, even though he gets glared at for it. “Aw, he didn’t mention my incredible good looks? You wound me, Bones.”

“Don’t have the chili,” Bones says, ignoring the remark and continuing to scroll through his menu. “They use Andorian spices, and I didn’t bring the extra-large medkit.”

“No fair! I’m dying for some chili.” Jim winks at Jocelyn just as the expected rant starts up. A good rant really puts Bones in his element, and he’ll be a lot calmer and more rational after he’s done.

They smalltalk over steak (Jim’s, ordered medium to avoid an appetite-killing lecture about tapeworms), chicken parmigiana (Bones’s), grilled salmon (Jocelyn’s), and steamed seasonal vegetables (shared), and all is good good good. Mister and the former Mrs McCoy have the kind of charming manners Jim’s mom and various orbiting adults tried long and hard to install into the Wild Brothers Kirk over the years, to no avail. And the wine is good, also, red and heady. And somehow he doesn’t feel out of place, despite the fact that he’s really only been in joints like this before when he was the one fetching replacement forks and asking if everyone’s meal is suitably awesome.

Afterwards, there’s the classic choice of dessert or coffee or dessert and then coffee. To Jim’s amazement, Bones allows himself to be talked into “a little bit of decadence so poor Jim and I don’t feel guilty”. So there is chocolate cake, oh, God, the chocolate cake. And cream. Jim barely notices what the other two are eating because virtually every time he raises his head it’s to groan, gaze unseeingly at the ceiling, and savour. He now begins to see that the claim that some chocolatey items are better than sex does have some merit. Not enough to convince him, but enough that he won’t scoff the next time someone tells him that. Well, he won’t scoff as loudly as usual. Though it’s quite possible that his tongue will water in Pavlovian fashion at the very mention of chocolate for, like, the rest of his _life_ , man.

“Forgive my friend,” Bones says wryly, “he’s having an orgasm. In slow motion.”

Usually, Jim can bring himself to care that he’s being mocked. But not when there is cake remaining, oh fuck no.

Jocelyn McCoy—can’t recall her new last name, or old last name, or whatever, right now—has one of those adorably tinkly laughs that probably get annoying after the first thousand or so times, but Jim’s never dated a tinkly-laugher long enough to find out. “Perhaps we should be grateful he’s not a screamer?”

Jim chokes on cake, which is a crime because this cake is too fucking awesome for words. He gulps down some more wine while glaring at them both and doing his very best to keep a straight face.

“I do believe I like your friend, Leonard. Where did you meet?”

“On a shuttle,” Bones begins, but doesn’t get any further. 

Jim finally looks over, sees him tracing patterns in his fruity-swirl ice cream with his spoon. “I told him the shuttle probably wouldn’t crash,” he puts in helpfully. “Then I bummed a drink from his hip flask. And an epic friendship begins. Not that I told him that for, like, six months or something. I kinda doubted that a bitter paranoiac with no taste in booze—” strong fingers squeeze painfully just above his knee at this point, almost certainly not by accident “—would take all that kindly to ‘Hello, I’m Jim, and you’re my new best friend for life. Hug me?’”

Bones stifles some small sound of amusement behind his hand. Jocelyn tinkles again.

“The second time we bumped into one another, I hit him up for sex. He totally didn’t notice, knocking my sexual confidence forever.”

“I noticed,” Bones says shortly, and tosses back the last of his wine.

Jim laughs ruefully. “Ouch. Not helping, buddy.”

“Some of us simply know how to behave when propositioned by grateful patients we’ve just healed.” But he’s starting to look as if this conversation no longer makes him want to dig a hole to China with his spoon and disappear down it ASAP. “You were rather more flagrant the next time, as I recall.”

“Flagrant, that’s me.”

“And I seem to recall you piping up in the middle of a study session to offer me the unimaginable honour of being permitted to suck your sainted cock.” His gaze flicks back, briefly, to Jocelyn, and his voice changes. “Which offer, of course, I declined.”

“That’s a pity,” she says blandly, tapping her electronic menu to indicate her coffee preference. “Sex always did you good, and Jim here obviously didn’t mind if you were on the rebound.”

Awkwardness drives them all silent right about then, and they busy themselves ordering and waiting for their coffee. They decide to take it to one of the leather sofas that face the windows out on to the bright lights of San Francisco. Jim finds himself sprawled next to Jocelyn, while Bones sits, legs spread, elbows on knees, on a footstool by his legs. 

“We never talked about this, not properly,” Jocelyn murmurs, “and perhaps it’s not right to do it in front of Jim.”

“Jim stays,” Bones says, firmly.

Jocelyn’s lips purse. She takes a deep breath. “All right. Leo, you were always… matter-of-fact about sex. It was never a big deal to you, just something fun we could do that felt good. I just figured that’s how you were, a man too passionate about other things in his life to want soul-rocking sex, a man with an average libido, or a little on the low side.”

She glances at Jim, who worries that perhaps he made some audible response to that accusation of Bones having a low libido. But no, the look they share is confirmation, understanding. He needn’t even hint that Bones is hot for it pretty much all the time with him. She knows, and she knows it’s no slight on her.

Bones, however, looks confused. And bright red. Jim knocks their feet together, the most undercover reassurance he can really offer here.

“I didn’t divorce you because you like men, Leo, or because you couldn’t stop when you said you would.”

Jim’s breath catches at that. It’s news to him. Bones, he notes, is looking assiduously at everything except his former spouse.

“You know what they say about ‘if you love something, set it free’? I saw you, making _passionate_ love to someone, and after that I couldn’t believe you could even begin to be truly happy while you were married to me. So I let you go. Only you didn’t want to go, so I had to be strong and push. And I knew you’d never come back to me, Leo. I just knew you’d be happier without me, and I hoped eventually I might be too.” She sips her coffee. “And I am. It’s for the best.”

Bones is up and gone so quickly Jim doesn’t have time to think before he’s out of sight in the dimly-lit dining room.

He’s torn between wanting to give chase and knowing that Bones would have hauled him along if he’d wanted company, between wanting to chat further with Jocelyn since she’s helping him understand so much and wanting to preserve Bones’s privacy. He sighs, balances his cup carefully on his thigh and scrubs a hand over his face.

“I broke him,” Jocelyn says. “I know I did. But I have high hopes he’s fixable.”

“He is,” Jim responds immediately, more out of loyalty than thought. “But I think he kinda… left a bit of his soul back home in Georgia, with—”

“With Joanna.”

“Yeah.”

Jocelyn laughs, but it’s a sad, deformed thing this time. “It would be a lot easier to sort out custody agreements and visiting arrangements if he didn’t have his comm program set to block all contact from my lawyers.”

Jim snorts. That’s just the sort of thing Bones would do on one of his low days, thinking that no one who helped destroy his life could possibly have anything worthwhile to say to him now. Who knew, he might even have forgotten he’d set it that way. “I’ll talk to him.”

“Not tonight, I think.”

Jim glances heavenwards. Whistles through his teeth. “No. But if there’s any chance—”

“There is. Enough time’s passed now that I can see how much she misses him. And he’s a good man. Olive branches are available. But some rule or other says the lawyers need to make the first official overtures, so…”

Jim nods. He might know jack shit about Georgia-specific law, never having been arrested there, but he knows full well that laws can be weird and inconsistent and alien-influenced, some of them have even been “streamlined and rendered more efficient and less emotive” by strait-laced Vulcan attorneys, but everywhere there’s law, Jim knows, there is pointless bureaucratic bullshit by the bushel. “I’m on it,” he says, and is briefly surprised at how very _responsible_ he sounds.

“Does he take care of you as well as you take care of him?”

Jim smiles. “Better. Though with more crotchety complaining and random poking with hyposprays.”

“Good,” she says emphatically, and resumes work on her coffee. 

They drink, and stare out at the city, and it’s surprisingly difficult to remember that Bones allegedly wanted him here in case of a sudden attack of homicidal rage towards this soft-spoken, charming, and pretty fucking easy on the eyes ex-wife of his. No, Jim thinks. Bones actually wanted him here to see where the pieces fell, so he’d know where to pick them up from after.

It takes another five minutes, and then there’s a hand snaking down over the back of the sofa to land heavily on Jim's shoulder. “Time we were making tracks, kid. Joss, you need a lift to your hotel?”

She’s on her feet in a flash, smoothing down her skirt and shouldering her bag. “Apparently it’s not far. I think I’ll walk. If you folks would point me in the right direction?”

“Of course,” Bones says, all manners again now.

“I’ll just go and see about the bill,” she says. “Won’t be a—”

“Already taken care of,” Bones says, sounding distinctly smug. 

Jim, still sitting, cranes his neck to look from one to the other. Jocelyn looks pissed off but also unsurprised and a bit amused. This would seem to be an old argument between them, then. Or a game. He’s not sure how he feels about that. But he gets up, puts his empty cup down on the nearest table, takes his place by Bonesy’s side. They go.

The night air seems oddly warm for this city, but no one’s complaining. They help Jocelyn get her bearings, and then it’s all aboard the goodbye express. This time, both men get hugged.

“You’re good together,” she whispers in Jim’s ear. “I can tell.”

He squeezes her a little in acknowledgement, but lets her go before Bones can get any nutty ideas into his head.

***

Sex that night is quick and dirty. Bones is so demanding, so frantic, that Jim ends up taking him bent over the bed with minimal prep, their pants still around their ankles. It’s rough and desperate and they’ll likely both be feeling it later. Afterwards, Bones emerges from his shower to lie trembling in Jim’s arms until Captain Fantastic wakes from his doze and they have a slower, calmer, face to face second round which actually seems to settle some of those pesky emotions for the night.

They fall asleep curled tightly together.

***

The new semester brings with it a small, but appreciated, drop in Jim’s workload. And an uptick in pestering from Bones about Renewal of Annual Vaccinations; the Earth-Shattering Importance Thereof (And Don’t You Roll Your Goddamn Eyes At Me, Kid, I Got A Hypo For That, Too).

They still haven’t talked about Jocelyn. Or Joanna. And they need to, Jim knows. He sits in classes on command protocols, intermediate Klingon language, astrophysics and the like, and daydreams up a hundred ways The Conversation might start. And they all suck, always. And it’s a stupid idea, anyway. He’d just forget what he was supposed to say at a crucial moment, or else Bones would muck up the entire script with one pithy criticism of a superior officer or random accidental striking of mind-bendingly sexy pose. 

Eventually, he starts composing a message asking his mom for advice, but really there’s a shit-ton of backstory here, not much of which he actually wants to share, and he only gets as far as:

_Mom? I met someone a while back. He’s awesome. We fit. How do you feel about maybe one day having a doctor in the family?_

But he can’t seem to put the right words in the right order after that, or even the not-completely-wrong words in the possibly-could-have-been-worse order. His finger hovers over the delete icon for about two decades. Well, until certain of his arm muscles have started to twitch and various fellow cadets are shooting odd glances at him, anyway. He and Winona… well, it’s been a while since they’ve spoken. But they’re fundamentally on good, if distant, terms, right? And he would like to keep it that way. And she probably would like to know that he’s been dating the same person for, like, months now. It would make her happy. So, eventually, he just rereads what he’s written, appends a signature of _Jim_ , and sends it, poof, out into the ether to zing its way through networks and across relays and past comets and red giants and asteroid belts until somehow, hopefully some time in the next few hours, some inconceivable distance from here, the comm officer on the _USS Mandelbrot_ catches it, logs it, and routes it down to Commander Kirk in officers’ quarters.

Then he chews his nails a little bit, enough to relieve the tension. Hopefully not enough for Bones to notice and scold him. He’d much rather be scolded for stupid things than actual weaknesses.

***

Jim’s pocket communicator beeps discreetly that night, while he is stretched out, teasing out the strands of a complex tactical problem in his head as he listens to Bones snuffle softly in his sleep. At the sound, Jim stirs, rolls carefully onto his side, reaches over Bones towards the crowded nightstand. His fingers find a padd rather than his communicator, so he logs into his account on that, hoping the light from the screen isn’t enough to wake Bones, who fortunately has his back to Jim.

_Jimmy, that’s wonderful! Tell me all about him—well, as much as you’re ready to. Are you happy? Listen, there’s a chance we’ll be able to patch a call through next week, around 0200 FST on stardate 2256.264—it’ll be laggy, but we could talk face to face. If you’d like. No pressure. And I’ll understand if you’re busy. I have to go now—we’re grabbing what readings we can of this truly amazing stellar phenomenon as we whip past it. Have to go save a civilisation from some virulent outbreak, might not be able to swing back this way again any time soon, you know how it is. Anyway, take care. I miss you. x x x. Mom._

Jim reads the message several times, as the familiar pleasure and love and sadness and strange disappointment fight for dominance in his chest. Eventually, he realises that he’s smiling. He switches off the padd, slides it under the pillow. Spoons in behind Bones, who grumbles in not-quite-speech and clumsily covers Jim’s hand on his hip with his own.

***

He wakes up a few minutes before the alarm is set to go off, to find Bones watching him sleepily, morning wood clearly in evidence against Jim’s thigh. Fortunately the lube is easily reachable, and they take care of each other with firm, unhurried strokes, intense eye contact substituting for the kisses that would be ruined by Bones’s totally toxic morning breath.

“There,” Bones squeaks suddenly, arching. “Just—just there…”

Jim has no idea what he’s doing that’s so amazing, he’s not really changed up his technique at all. Sometimes he half suspects that Bones has tiny erogenous zones, like that one by his navel, that appear and disappear at random. At any rate, whatever it is that’s feeling so good, he clearly keeps it up, because Bones continues whining, starts thrusting rapidly into his hand, his own fingers squeezing compulsively on Jim’s dick in a way that might be annoying if it wasn’t so fucking hot to see him like this.

“Come for me,” Jim murmurs, more dare than command.

Bones goes very still. Then he shouts, spurting all over Jim’s hand and stomach and writhing all the way through it. It seems to take him a long time to come down again after. But Bones debauched is such a devastating sight Jim almost doesn’t mind that no one’s paying his cock any attention anymore.

“Wow,” he observes. “Good, huh?”

Bones just stares at him, like he’s performed three impossible feats before breakfast or something. Then he disappears down under the covers. Shoves Jim onto his back. Lowers his mouth to kiss Captain Fantastic, who _really_ doesn’t mind morning breath.

The man has a way of giving blowjobs that makes you feel like you’re doing _him_ a favour, and, man, is that exciting or what? He sucks greedily, moans like he’s loving it, doesn’t let up till he’s swallowed Jim’s load. Then he crawls back up the bed, sprawls out on Jim’s chest. He looks drowsy and self-satisfied, like a cat resting in the sunshine after a hard day’s mousing. Jim grabs himself a nice handful of ass and enjoys the closeness, all that lovely skin on skin.

“So,” he says cautiously, “I kinda told my mom that I’m seeing someone. Didn’t give her details, but I’d like to.”

The tension, in the room and in the other man’s body, is instantly palpable.

“Bones? Listen, man, I know you said to let people draw their own conclusions, but my mom can’t exactly, you know, randomly show up for a visit and notice how you look at me. I think she kinda deserves to know that I, you know—” it’s hard to say, it really is, and he has to swallow heavily first “—that I’m doing the long-term relationship thing. With someone awesome.”

It still feels like parts of the body above him have inexplicably congealed and tightened up. Jim attempts to soothe, rubbing gentle hands up and down Bones’s back.

“You freaking out? Because—”

Their wake-up alarm sounds. Jim swears fluently while Bones tells the computer what it can go do with itself.

“We’ll talk later,” Bones says, into the ringing silence. “I want the first shower. Change the sheets for me?”

“Sure.”

So, yeah, he feels a little guilty for allowing the postponement of what felt like an important conversation, but all the same…

Jim sighs as he strips the bed, already reviewing the topics for today’s classes with half a brain. The sound of water running in the bathroom is comforting, somehow.

***

The message blinks at Jim all through lunch, while he sits in the mess waiting, waiting, and picking unenthusiastically at his food. Bones never shows.

_I didn’t realise you were thinking of us in those terms. LHM._

Just what the fuck he is supposed to say to that Jim has no semblance of an idea. How Bones can be so bright and yet so fucking oblivious sometimes is beyond him. He resists the urge to hide his face in his hands because, hey, Frank was always telling him that could cause acne, and it’d be just his luck to ignore the one spiteful thing dear Frank ever said that might actually be true. But goddamn, he has a headache.

***

They go for a run in the foggy evening. Jim’s a runner, but Bones only enjoys the experience with company, with someone to challenge and be challenged by. He’d much rather do other cardio, otherwise, but in Jim’s opinion running is a potentially life-saving ability that all cadets should be cultivating. So they run, occasionally jostling for the lead, for the chance to choose the next turn of the path, the difficult terrain or the easy, the steep hill or the steps down. And it’s a good run, really. Despite the, um, brief pause for some absolutely essential sweat-scented making out up against a tree in the woods.

“First one back gets a BJ in the shower,” Jim suggests.

Bones gives him an assessing look. And then he’s off like a mad squirrel, and Jim is hampered in his pursuit by an unforeseen bout of helpless laughter.

Jim winds up giving the blowjob. (But he absolutely could have won the race, if he’d wanted to, doubt him not.) Bones leans back against the wall and swears softly in Southern. Jim tries to touch himself and gets some sharp hair-yankage as punishment.

“Waah?” he complains, with Bones’s dick still on his tongue.

“I—” Awesome suction resumes. “—oh, fuck. I don’t want you coming… until we’re in bed… and you’re… inside…”

“Hmmmm,” Jim agrees. He’d be perfectly satisfied just jerking off while he does Bones right here. But when his lover’s so fucking keen on the old ass-fucking, who is Jim Kirk to argue? So he directs some of his attention back behind the awesome Bonesy balls he’s been toying with, tickles at his hole instead, and isn’t at all surprised when he promptly receives a whine of warning followed by a flood of bitter Bonesy goodness.

The bastard is annoyingly dictatorial about Jim meticulously drying every single part of himself before they head out of the bathroom. But, eventually, a daring escape is made, and Jim has the satisfaction of wrestling Bones to the mattress and feeling his legs drop almost automatically open in invitation.

 _I love you, Leonard McCoy_ , he thinks, and not just because Bones is already scrabbling for the lube (though that certainly doesn’t hurt).

“Now talk,” Bones grunts, as Jim completes the push inside.

It takes a moment for this to process. He catches his breath, tries to focus on speech. “Now?”

“Why not?”

_Why not, says he of the currently-floppy dick._

“Surely the great James T. Kirk can multitask.”

“Oh, you did _not_ just—” But he loses the rest of the thought as Bones twines his legs around him, subtly altering the angle and depth of the next thrust.

“Mm-hmmm,” drawls Bones, all smug and Southern. Jim fucks harder for that, working to earn a break from the smug (the South can stay; Bones’s accent is dead sexy). “So what—ah—did you want to speak to me about, again?”

It’s impossible to resist some growling and biting of shoulders after that. And then he says what has to be just about the most unlikely thing that could ever come out of his mouth. “I want you to commit to this goddamn relationship, damn it.”

They’re out of sync on the next thrust. Fingernails score down Jim’s back, and he’s not sure what to make of it because Bones _never_ does that.

“We can be discreet,” he grits out. “Don’t have to advertise it. But the people who need to know, need to know, you know? Your fucking _ex-wife_ knows, and I can’t tell my mother?”

“Anything else?”

Rather than scream in frustration, Jim pounds Bones’s ass harder. “Yeah. If you’re never ever gonna fuck me, let me down gently, okay? I’ll go invest in some dildos.”

The expression that slides onto Bones’s face is strange, and it’s at about this point that Jim notices that the Bonester is getting his backbone back. Then he’s wriggling, unhooking his legs, shifting so that—

“Damn it, Jim, move your arm. And lift up, will you? I need—” He needs to twist himself into a human pretzel, apparently, with his legs up over Jim's shoulders and his hips barely kissing the bed.

Jim has to go up on his knees to make it work, supporting most of his weight on his arms, up off Bones, but in this position he also thrusts deliciously deeper and they both grunt with the pleasure of it. Funny how sexy that standard Bones frown looks when it appears in the context of sex.

“So you want—you want to be my boyfriend?” 

“Boyfriend,” Jim agrees, punctuating the word with a hard thrust. “Lover. Partner. Fiancé.” God, he sounds breathless. There’s no way this is gonna last much longer. “Whatever word you like that means you’re mine and I’m yours.”

Bones squeezes around him, head thrashing on the pillow like it’s too good, too much. He reaches down between them, seizes hold of his dick, and, fuck, it will never not be hot to watch Leonard McCoy touch himself.

“Ohgodohjim oh God, _yes_ , all right? _Yes_ , goddamn it!”

Jim might not be sure how to spell it, but he likes that answer.

***

“So much for talking,” Jim grumbles, after they’ve cleaned up and settled in for the night. “I did all right, but you? Not exactly a model of coherency, were you?”

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t expecting to get hard again, was I?”

Jim snickers at the complaining tone and leans over to steal a kiss. Bones still tastes like toothpaste, which is oddly endearing. “So, what was your answer, again?” he sing-songs.

“The answer was yes, you conceited ass.”

There’s a distinct possibility he’d get smacked in the mouth if Bones could see his current grin. “Exxxxxcellent. Two more things.”

Despite the darkness, Bones appears to feel the need to bury his face in his hands.

“One, I was serious about the fucking. You gotta do me sometime, Bones. Pretty please?”

There’s a pause, and what might be a shrug. “All right. But I gotta warn you, I can get a bit… vocal when I do that. It’s embarrassing.”

It’s a big ol’ manly effort not to press for further details. He makes do with stroking a hand up and down what turns out to be Bones’s chest.

“And the second thing, dare I ask?”

It’s tempting to preface this with a warning not to freak out, only Jim strongly suspects that sort of thing is counterproductive in most cases. “Your ex wants to renegotiate your custody paperwork or whatever to give you more access to Joanna. But you need to unblock her lawyers so their comms can get through.”

“Huh,” Bones says. Jim hears him take a big breath, as if to say more, but there’s only silence for a long, long time.

Eventually, there’s a mutter of something that might be “Okay, kid,” but Jim’s nine-tenths asleep by that point and can’t really be sure.

***

“Hi, Mom.”

Winona Kirk’s enthusiastic cry of “Jimmy!” reaches him before the picture catches up to show her smile. He loves her for not showing any surprise that he actually bothered taking up her suggestion to call.

“How’s it going out there?”

“Fantastic. We’ve just discovered an entirely new—hang on, important things first. What’s this I hear about a new man in your life?” The picture stutters, and suddenly she’s wagging her finger at him. “And why do I get the feeling you’ve been holding out on me for some time, young man?”

Jim laughs, despite himself. Whatever their differences, it’s long been clear to him that his mom is Good People. “Bones is awesome. We met on the shuttle to the academy. He’s a doctor and a drinker and he’s always needling me to take better care of myself. You’d like him.”

“Am I detecting a certain reluctance to offer up a real name here?”

Jim smirks. “I don’t want you pestering him over the comms. Or falling in love with his picture.”

“And you’ve been together how long?”

“Uh, we’re still kinda disagreeing about that. He says a week, and I say, like, almost a _year_.”

He doesn’t understand what the sound is until the video catches up and he sees her clap her hands. “Oh, Jimmy, that’s wonderful. I can’t wait to meet him. So you’d better hang on tight to this man of yours until I get back to Earth.”

Long habit prevents Jim from enquiring just when that might be.

“I will, Mom. I will.”

***

It turns out that what Bones meant by “very vocal” was more like “very vulgar”. He’s barely got his cock sliding into Jim’s much-neglected hole before he starts in with the “take it, yeah, just like that”, and the “you look so good stuffed full of my cock” and the “such a fucking goddamn slut, aren’t you?” Jim grins, oddly touched, and allows Bones to wax poetical on the subject of what a greedy bottom Jim is and how much he doesn’t truly deserve Bones’s wonderful dick.

They’re maybe five minutes in when something changes.

“Just like that, sugar,” Bones says, and Jim blinks.

“Oh, you’re so good to me, darlin’.” His thrusts falter and he frowns, as if he doesn’t know where these words are coming from. He bites his lip, as if that will keep the words in, but mere moments later he’s starting up again. “That’s it, sweetheart. Love how you take it. So perfect.”

He tries shifting them so he can bury his face in Jim’s neck, but still he can’t seem to shut up. “Love this. Love you. My Jim. Such a—such a—” He groans, starts sucking a mark into Jim’s neck. His whole body seems to spasm as he comes.

It seems to take Bones a long, long time to recover, but when he does he launches himself mouth-first at Jim’s still-hard cock and sets about driving him to a powerful orgasm in short order.

They clean up, then get back into bed and lie staring at the ceiling, breaths loud in the quiet room.

“Well,” Jim says, “that was different.” He pauses, but can’t resist. “ _Sweetheart._ ”

Bones hits him repeatedly with a pillow while Jim roars with laughter.

***

In the morning, Bones insists on giving Jim three booster shots he’s pretty sure weren’t actually overdue yet, and after that all is good and calm as they stride together out of Bones’s building and towards the heart of campus.

One of these days, Jim thinks, he will manage the awesome feat of truly understanding Leonard McCoy.

In the meantime, he’s quite happy to play things by ear.

***

**EPILOGUE**

They’re on their way to Georgia when the final necessary pieces of Jim’s life begin to fall into place at last. Sharing a seat in a good old-fashioned bus, as it happens, because it’s the only way to travel that won’t spoil Bones’s anticipation for the upcoming Thanksgiving dinner with Jo (and Jocelyn, and The Treadway, her new man) with anxiety over the alleged likelihood of dying horribly on the way. Well, they could have hired a car and taken turns driving, Jim supposes. But this is more economical _and_ affords the desirable possibility of a) snuggling, b) sleeping during the day-and-a-half journey, c) travelling non-stop because no one has to sleep, and d) maintaining a steady 110 kilometres per hour because the dedicated busways are smooth and safe and the computer control system is fast and efficient enough to get them smoothly out of any freak scenario involving speed, rare other buses, and/or highway obstructions like deer. Buses are so boringly safe that Bones once even declared them “safer than horses”.

Anyway, here Jim is, pressed against Bones’s side as the bus glides through the early evening, the only sounds the small shufflings and murmurings of other passengers, mostly sleeping, and the hum of an engine which has been so steady so long that if Jim doesn’t think about it he doesn’t notice it anymore. He’s considering how it would rate, really, on the international scale of rude, to drag Bones down the back and into the bus’s bathroom so he can blow him in reasonable privacy. It’s not that he wants sex, exactly, it’s just that he’s… restless. He’s always had a somewhat uneasy relationship with the open road, never entirely trusting where it might take him and what he might do there. But Bones is here, and doesn’t Bones always keep him out of trouble?

“Penny for them,” Bones says, and yawns.

Jim hadn’t realised he was making his thoughtful face, but, apparently… “I dunno, Bones. I guess I’m just… happy. And wondering how badly I’m about to fuck it up.”

“With Jo?”

Jim shrugs guiltily.

“You won’t. I don’t think you could if you _tried_.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you’re Jim Kirk.” His fingers curl around the back of Jim’s neck, and he plants a slow kiss on his temple. “Also, you’re kinda smitten with her dad, and that tends to be a selling point.”

“Oh.” Jim can feel a blush coming on. But it’s true, isn’t it? “I kinda am, yeah.” He feels blindly for Bones’s hand, doesn’t want to look away from the warmth in those familiar brown eyes. He wants to say more, wants to formalise it with _those_ words, but for now at least they won’t come.

“It’s all right, kid. As it happens I am rather smitten with you, too.”

Jim is just trying to fight off his stupid grin when his comm chimes. He fumbles for it automatically, pulls up the message and doesn’t mind that Bones is reading over his shoulder.

_We’re headed for Spacedock for minor refit—some of the anomalies we’ve found out here require the latest and greatest sensor technologies if we’re really going to understand them fully. So it looks like I’ll be home for Chrismukkah. (Remind me what we’re up to?) Completely understand if you’re busy, but let me know if you want to do something. Mom. Oh, and kisses to Bones. x x x_

Jim obediently pecks Bones once on each cheek and once on the nose. He is suddenly, unassailably happy, reminded of just how wonderfully perverse and ridiculous his mother can be. “So, you wanna meet her?”

“Be delighted,” Bones says, turning more towards him in the seat.

“No, seriously, if you don’t want—”

“You’re family, Jim. So’s your mom. Of course I want to meet her.”

“She’ll probably squeeze your ass or something.”

That mobile eyebrow climbs. “I’m sure my ass will cope, the practice it’s been getting at your hands. So what does she mean, remind her?”

Jim smiles. “We always used to alternate, year to year. Either Christmas with a little bit of Hanukkah, or Hanukkah with a little bit of Christmas. Once we went pagan and celebrated the solstice instead. The Yule log was awesome. I like fire…”

“I just bet you do. Let’s see how Thanksgiving goes, okay? Maybe we can invite her up to Atlanta.”

“Bones, you don’t have to do—”

“Family, Jim. Family. Now how about we tilt this seat back so we can get some sleep? You’re one crotchety bastard when you’re sleep-deprived.”

“Takes one to know one.” Jim pokes out his tongue. Bones leans in to nibble it.

As they get lost in slow, dreamy kisses, Jim reflects that he owes Captain Pike a Christmas card and a bottle of something. Because coming to Starfleet? Quite probably the best snap decision of Jim’s life, because it’s given him a future which includes adventure, and spacefaring, and actual intellectual _challenge_ \--and, as if that wasn’t enough, it brought him to Bones. And when the fuck he got quite so sappy, even in the safety of his own head, he doesn’t know. But, Jim finds, he really doesn’t mind.

***END***

[](http://nix-this.livejournal.com/116389.html)


End file.
